j 


REV.  MICHAEL  SCHLATTER. 


The  Early  Father 


Reformed  Church 


UNITED  STATES. 


By  REV.  JAMES  I.  GOOD,   D.  D., 

// 

Author  of  "Origin  of  the  Reformed  Church  in  Germany,"  "History  of  the 

Reformed  Church  in  Germany,"  and  "Historical  Handbook 

of  the  Reformed  Church  in  the  U.  S." 


READING,  PA.  : 
DANIEL  MILLER,  PUBLISHER. 


COPYRIGHT,  1897, 
BY  DANIEL  MILLER. 


.  L.1OUAU  I 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
?5!9/  SANTA  BARBARA 


PREFACE. 


This  little  volume  is  issued  at  tbe  suggestion  of  its 
publisher,  Mr.  Daniel  Miller.  It  is  hoped  that  it  will 
increase  the  interest  of  our  people  in  their  splendid 
Church  history.  While  issued  in  connection  with  the 
sesqui-centennial  of  our  Church,  it  has,  however,  a  per- 
manent value  in  bringing  the  lives  of  these  fathers  up  to 
date.  Harbaugh's  "  Fathers  of  the  Reformed  Church," 
Vols.  I.  and  II.,  were  excellent,  but  having  been  issued 
forty  years  ago,  are  now  somewhat  antiquated,  and  we 
have  endeavored  to  utilize  the  material  gathered  since 
their  issue. 

We  would  call  the  attention  of  the  readers  to  the 
latest  and  most  complete  history  of  the  Coetus  in  the 
"  Presbyterian  and  Reformed  Review"  for  October, 
1897.  THE  AUTHOR. 


CONTENTS. 


Peter  Minuit, 5 

Rev.  Samuel  Guldin, 14 

Rev.  John  Philip  Boehm, \     .     .  20 

Rev.  George  Michael  Weiss, 31 

Rev.  Michael  Schlatter, 40 

Rev.  John  Philip  Leydich, 56 

Rev.  William  Otterbein, 64 


EEFOEMED  CHURCH  IN  THE  U.  S. 


I. 
PETER  MINTJIT. 

The  forerunner  of  our  German  Reformed  Church 
was  Peter  Mintiit.  He  was  the  earliest  prominent  Ger- 
man in  North  America.  More  than  a  century  before 
our  Church  was  organized,  he  landed  in  the  Delaware 
(about  1638), and  purchased  Delaware  and  Pennsylvania 
up  to  Trenton.  His  life  is,  in  many  respects,  a  signi- 
ficant type  of  the  German  Reformed  who  began  com- 
ing more  than  a  half  century  later. 

Peter  Minuit  was  born  in  1580,  at  Wesel,  in  north- 
western Germany,  one  of  the  strongholds  of  the  Re- 
formed Church  in  the  sixteenth  century.  Born  so  early, 
he  almost  touches  the  Reformers  of  our  Church,  for  both 
Olevianus  and  Ursinus  were  living  when  he  was  born. 
2 


6     EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

He  may,  therefore,  be  called  the  link  between  the 
authors  of  the  Heidelberg  Catechism  and  the  Reformed 
of  the  western  world.  Indeed,  Olevianus  must  have 
been  a  well  known  name  to  him  in  boyhood,  for  he 
came  from  that  part  of  Germany.  He  was  of  Hugu- 
enot or  French  Reformed  stock,  for  Wesel  had  become 
a  great  asylum  for  the  Reformed  in  the  days  of  the 
Reformation.  As  a  result,  a  large  French  Reformed 
church  was  formed  there,  of  which  later  Peter  Minuit 
was  a  deacon.  He  left  Wesel  during  the  awful  Thirty 
Years'  War,  just  before  it  was  captured  by  the  Span- 
iards and  the  Reformed  subjected  to  great  persecutions. 
Like  many  of  his  German  cotemporaries,  he  entered 
the  Dutch  service,  for  the  ruler  of  Holland  was  also  a 
German  prince  of  the  house  of  Nassau.  He  must  have 
been  a  man  of  prominence  in  his  native  city,  to  be  so 
soon  appointed  to  so  prominent  an  office.  For  he  left 
Wesel,  April  15,  1625,  and  by  December  19  of  that 
year  was  appointed  governor  general  of  New  Amster- 
dam (New  York)  in  America.  He  sailed  from  Am- 
sterdam in  the  ship  Sea  Mew,  January  9,  1626,  and 
landed  at  New  York,  May  4,  1626.  He  there  became 
the  governor  general  of  the  West  India  Company  of 
Holland,  whose  object  was  to  plant  colonies  in  Amer- 
ica, and  to  extend  to  this  continent  the  blessings  of 
civil  and  religious  freedom.  As  he  was  of  French 


PETER    MINUIT.  7 

blood,  yet  of  German  birth  and  in  the  employment  of 
the  Dutch,  he  was  thus  well  fitted  to  represent  the 
future  Reformed  churches  of  America,  which  have 
been  made  up  of  Dutch,  German  and  French  elements. 
He  was  an  enlightened  statesman.  He  stands  out 
in  history  as  the  first  to  treat  the  Indians  with  justice. 
While  the  Spaniards  had  by  force  of  arms  dispossessed 
the  Indians  of  their  lands  by  fire  and  blood  in  Mexico 
and  Peru,  Minuit  at  once  set  up  the  policy  of  buying 
the  land  from  them.  Although  the  Dutch  had  taken 
New  York  by  the  right  of  discovery  by  Henry  Hud- 
son, yet  he  determined  to  get  a  higher  title  to  the 
land,  namely  by  the  right  of  purchase.  His  first 
act  was  to  purchase,  in  1626,  the  whole  of  Manhattan 
Island,  22,000  acres  (now  the  site  of  New  York  City) 
for  24  dollars.  This  may  seem  a  small  sum  when  one 
considers  the  enormous  value  of  New  York  property 
now,  but  it  was  not  too  little  when  one  remembers  the 
absolutely  unimproved  condition  of  the  island,  as  well 
as  the  fact  that  24  dollars  then  was  worth  much  more 
than  that  amount  now,  especially  to  the  Indians. 
William  Penn  has  usually  had  the  reputation  of  inau- 
gurating this  policy  of  peaceful  purchase  from  the 
Indians,  but  Minuit  here  began  it  eighteen  years  before 
Penn  was  born.  Honor  to  whom  honor  is  due.  It 
was  not  only  a  very  enlightened  policy,  but  a  very 


a. 


8      EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

wise,  far-seeing  one.  For  by  this  act  he  retained  for 
the  Dutch,  for  many  years,  the  friendship  of  the  Iro- 
quois  or  Five  Nations  of  the  Indians,  and  through  this 
the  New  York  colony  largely  escaped  the  horrors  of 
Indian  wars.  For  the  Iroquois  acted  as  a  rampart 
against  the  French  of  Canada  and  their  Indian  allies, 
the  Algouquins.  Having  bought  Manhattan  Island, 
he  built  on  it  a  four-angled  fort,  faced  with  stone.  His 
colony  prospered  so  much  under  his  administration 
that  in  a  few  years  the  fur  trade  amounted  to  143,000 
guilders.  He  fostered  agriculture,  and  fields  of  grain 
began  to  wave  on  the  island.  Herds  of  cattle  were 
seen  roving  over  its  pasture,  and  supplying  the  fort 
with  milk  and  food.  Minuit  also  gained  the  friend- 
ship of  the  governor  of  New  England,  which  strength- 
ened both  of  these  Protestant  colonies  against  the  hos 
tile  power  of  Spain. 

He  was  an  earnest  Christian.  He  at  once  looked 
after  the  spiritual  condition  of  his  colony.  There  had 
been  consolers  of  the  sick,  who  held  service  in  the 
colony  before  1628,  but  in  that  year  Rev.  Mr.  Mich- 
aelis,  the  first  Reformed  minister,  became  pastor. 
Minuit  fostered  this  congregation,  providing  it  with  a 
place  of  worship  in  the  loft  of  the  mill  in  the  fort.  He 
showed  his  strong  attachment  to  the  Reformed  faith  by 
his  attendance  on  its  services,  and  by  being  an  elder  in 


PETER   MINUIT. 

this  new  congregation.  But  his  stay  at  New  York  did 
not  continue  very  long,  for  the  patroons  attempted 
to  lay  hold  of  the  best  lands  of  the  colony.  Minuit 
opposed  this  aristocracy,  and  as  a  result  was  compelled 
to  resign.  But  during  the  six  years  that  he  was  gov- 
ernor, he  laid  the  foundations  of  one  of  the  greatest  of 
our  states  and  the  greatest  of  our  cities,  as  well  as  one 
of  the  oldest  churches  in  this  continent.  u  His  integ- 
rity as  an  officer,"  says  a  writer,  "  served  to  raise  up 
against  him  a  host  of  enemies/'  He  resigned  and 
sailed  for  Holland,  March,  1632,  having  in  his  vessel 
5,000  beaver  skins  as  evidence  of  the  prosperity  of  his 
rule. 

But  it  is  not  with  his  governorship  in  New  York 
that  we  are  most  interested.  We  have  referred  to  it 
because  it  reveals  the  greatness  of  his  character.  But 
we  in  Pennsylvania  are  interested  in  Minuit  because  of 
a  later  expedition  that  he  brought  to  America.  The 
Dutch  West  India  Company  having  cast  him  aside,  hjs 
great  knowledge  of  America  was  to  be  utilized  by 
another  government,  Sweden,  and  it  was  this  that 
brought  him  into  contact  with  Pennsylvania.  A  West 
India  Company  had  long  before  been  the  dream  of  that 
Swedish  conqueror,  Gustavus  Adolphus.  After  his 
death  the  company  became  active,  and  in  1637  Minuit 
was  appointed  its  director  general  or  governor.  It  is 


10    EAELY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

an  interesting  fact  to  us  that  the  great  Reformed  prince 
of  Germany,  Prince  John  Casimir  of  the  Palatinate 
(the  son  of  Elector  Frederick  III.,  who  caused  our 
catechism  to  be  written),  was  an  active  promoter  of  this 
Swedish  expedition.  Minuit  sailed  from  Gothenberg 
in  Sweden,  August,  1637,  with  two  vessels — a  man-of- 
war,  Key  of  Calmar,  and  a  transport,  Griffin.  He 
entered  Delaware  bay  and  landed  at  Clarke's  Point, 
March  15,  1638,  and  called  it  Paradise  Point.  Says 
Mr.  Conrad  in  a  recent  address  :  "  It  was  early  in  the 
springtime,  the  bursting  foliage  of  our  trees  and  shrubs, 
and  the  opening  wild  flowers  of  our  woodlands  and 
meadows  loaded  the  air  with  perfume.  After  a  long 
and  tedious  imprisonment  in  the  narrow  confines  of  a 
ship,  it  must  have  been  unspeakably  delightful  to  land 
on  this  promontory,  and  enjoy  the  freshness  and  beauty 
of  the  opening  spring.  They  felt  in  truth  they  were 
in  paradise,  and  so  called  it  Paradise  Point."  He  then 
turned  aside  from  the  Delaware  and  sailed  up  a  creek 
called  by  the  Indians  the  Minquas,  which  he  named 
Christina  in  honor  of  the  young  queen  of  Sweden. 
Passing  up  this  stream  for  two  miles,  they  landed  at  a 
point  called  "  The  Rocks,"  where  is  a  natural  wharf  of 
stone.  Finding  that  there  were  no  European  settlers 
in  that  part  of  America,  he  took  possession  of  the  land 
in  the  name  of  Sweden  by  right  of  discovery.  Here 


PETER    MINUIT.  11 

he  pursued  the  same  humane  policy  that  he  had  in  New 
York.  He  bought  the  land  of  the  Indians,  its  original 
possessors.  After  spending  a  couple  of  weeks  in  ex- 
ploring the  country,  he  met  the  Indian  chiefs,  March 
29,  1638,  at  Christina  Creek,  and  made  a  treaty  with 
the  Iroquois  by  which  all  the  country  from  Cape  Hen- 
lopen  northward  to  the  Falls  of  the  Delaware  at  Tren- 
ton was  bought  from  them  by  Sweden.  Thus  44  years 
before  Penn's  famous  treaty  under  the  elm  tree  at 
Shakamaxon  in  Philadelphia,  Minuit  had  begun  the 
peaceful  policy.  He  at  once  built  a  fort  on  the  Christ- 
ina Creek.  He  encouraged  the  Indians  to  bring  in 
furs.  He  was  so  successful  that  the  first  year  3,000 
skins  were  exported.  He  made  the  colony  so  strong; 
that  as  long  as  he  was  with  it  the  Dutch,  who  were 
jealous  of  it,  dared  not  attack  it.  Minuit  also  culti- 
vated friendly  relations  with  the  neighboring  English 
colony  in  Virginia,  so  that  they  might  aid  one  another 
in  case  of  war.  After  having  arranged  everything  in 
the  colony  for  its  safety  and  success,  Minuit  set  sail  for 
the  West  Indies,  to  exchange  his  cargo  for  a  cargo  of 
tobacco.  He  was  about  to  sail  away,  when  the  hospital- 
ities of  a  Dutch  captain  in  the  harbor  of  St.  Christopher 
were  offered  to  him  before  he  left.  During  his  visit  to 
the  Dutch  ship  a  terrific  hurricane  came  up,  which 
drove  all  the  vessels  in  the  harbor  out  to  sea.  Among 


12    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

those  that  sank  was  this  Dutch  vessel  with  Miuuit  and 
all  on  board. 

Thus  came  and  thus  passed  away  the  first  promi- 
nent German  Reformed  in  America.  He  is  interesting 
to  us  as  the  forerunner  of  our  Church.  He  organized 
the  first  Reformed  church  in  America  at  New  York,  in 
1628.  And  then  he  came  to  Delaware  and  eastern 
Pennsylvania  to  indirectly  prepare  the  way  for  the 
future  organization  of  our  Church.  It  is  true,  the  set- 
tlers of  Delaware  were  Lutherans,  for  all  Swedes  are 
Lutherans  ;  yet  a  great  many  of  the  colonists  to  Dela- 
ware were  Germans,  and  we  can  readily  suppose  that 
of  these  Germans  some  were  Reformed,  especially  as 
Prince  John  Casimir  of  the  Palatinate  was  interested 
in  the  expedition.  Still  the  early  Church  at  Delaware 
was  Lutheran.  However,  when  the  Dutch  captured 
Delaware  from  the  Swedes,  they  founded  a  Reformed 
church  at  Newcastle,  Delaware.  This  was  the  first 
appearance  of  the  Heidelberg  Catechism  in  this  part  of 
the  new  world.  This  church  was  in  existence  when 
William  Penu  landed  in  Pennsylvania,  and  for  many 
years  afterwards.  This  Dutch  occupation  of  Delaware 
and  Pennsylvania  led  to  the  establishment  of  the  first 
Reformed  church  in  Pennsylvania.  For  a  colony  of 
Dutch  settled  in  Bucks  county  at  Neshaminy  (now 
Churchville,  Bucks  county).  They  were  organized  into 


PETER    MINUIT.  13 

a  congregation  in  1710,  by  Rev.  Van  Vleck.  This 
minister  did  not  limit  his  labors  to  the  Dutch,  but 
finding  some  German  Reformed  in  that  district,  he  bap- 
tized some  of  them  at  Skippack  in  1710,  and  organized 
the  first  German  Reformed  congregation  at  White 
Marsh,  nortu  of  Philadelphia,  in  the  same  year.  This 
congregation  soon  after  went  to  pieces,  as  Van  Vleck 
left  Pennsylvania.  But  the  Germans  who  composed 
it  remained,  and  when  Boehm  fifteen  years  later  organ- 
ized a  Reformed  congregation  there,  we  find  the  same 
Germans  entering  into  it.  Thus,  though  Peter  Minuit 
died,  his  faith  remained  in  Pennsylvania  as  a  blessed 
legacy,  and  he  may  well  be  called  the  forerunner  of  our 
Church  in  America.* 

*  For  an  excellent  monograph  of  Peter  Minuit  we  refer  the  reader  to 
Rev.  Dr.  Cyrus  Cort's  "  Peter  Minuit  Memorial  " 


II. 

REV.  SAMUEL  GULDIN. 

If  Peter  Minuit  was  the  secular  forerunner  of  our 
Church  in  this  country,  Rev.  Samuel  Guldin  was  the 
spiritual  forerunner.  Not  that  Minuit  was  not  spirit- 
ual, for  he  was  a  deeply  religious  man  ;  but  he  repre- 
sented the  laity  and  the  political  element  of  our  Church 
in  American  history.  He  stands  out  for  what  the  laity 
have  here  done  for  our  Church,  and  his  life  is  a 
prophecy  of  what  our  Reformed  faith  has  since  done  for 
America — for  it  was  political  Calvinism  that  founded 
the  freedom  of  these  United  States.  Like  Minuit,  Gul- 
din was  a  forerunner ;  however,  his  \vork  was  not 
political,  but  distinctively  religious.  He  represents  the 
evangelism  that  made  our  Church  afterward  spread  so 
widely.  It  is  true,  Guldin  had  no  hand  in  the  organi- 
zation of  our  Church.  He  never  belonged  to  the 
Coetus,  our  first  Synod  in  Pennsylvania.  Still  his 
work  should  not  be  mimimized  on  that  account.  His 
preaching  prepared  the  way  for  organization.  Being 
probably  the  first  Reformed  minister  in  Pennsylvania, 
he  did  a  very  valuable  work  in  preaching  to  the  shep- 


EEV.    SAMUEL   GULDIN.  15 

berdless  Germans,  in  baptizing  their  children  and 
administering  the  Lord's  Supper.  Their  religious 
opportunities  were  so  few  that  the  coming  of  a  Re- 
formed minister  among  any  of  their  communities  was  a 
spiritual  uplift  to  them. 

Guldin  was  a  Swiss  Pietist.  The  story  of  his  con- 
version to  God  in  the  old  country  is  quite  interesting. 
In  1689  four  theological  students  of  Berne,  the  central 
canton  of  Switzerland,  went  on  a  tour  southward  to 
Lausanne  and  Geneva.  Guldin  was  one  of  them. 
These  students  determined  to  make  this  trip  a  religious 
pilgrimage,  so  they  resolved  to  avoid  all  useless  reli- 
gious discussion,  into  which  theological  students  so  often 
plunge,  and  devote  their  time  to  prayer.  As  a  result 
this  trip  led  them  to  deep  religious  conviction  and  high 
personal  consecration.  After  returning  to  their  home 
in  Berne,  three  of  them  went  to  Holland,  where  Guldin 
studied,  but  he  says  he  still  remained  blind  to  his  soul's 
salvation.  Full  conversion — the  blessed  forgiveness  of 
sin — the  finished  work  of  Christ  for  him — these  he  did 
not  yet  understand.  On  his  return  to  Berne,  he  became 
pastor  at  Stettlen,  a  country  parish,  and  remained  there 
for  nine  months.  But  he  felt  his  ministry  was  not 
being  blessed,  and  he  was  even  more  dissatisfied  with 
his  own  religious  experience  than  with  his  work.  So  he 
determined  to  give  up  the  ministry.  On  the  day  that 
he  was  about  preaching  his  farewell  sermon,  he  expe- 


16          EA.RLY    FATHERS   OF   THE  REF.    CHURCH. 

rienced  a  change  of  heart,  August  4,  1693,  between  the 
hours  of  9  and  10  A.  M.,  just  as  he  was  preparing  to 
preach  that  sermon.  He  did  not  preach  that  sermon, 
but  remained  with  his  congregation.  His  ministry 
now  became  very  blessed  and  successful.  He  no  longer 
preached  dry  dogmas  in  a  cold  and  lifeless  fashion,  but 
he  preached  the  Biblical  truths  illuminated  by  personal 
experience.  As  a  result  great  crowds  came  to  hear 
him,  even  from  other  parishes.  So  great  did  his  popu- 
larity become  that  a  little  over  a  year  after  he  was 
called  to  one  of  the  leading  pulpits  of  his  canton.  On 
December  21,  1694,  he  was  elected  assistant  at  the 
cathedral  of  the  city  of  Berne,  which  placed  him  in  the 
line  of  advancement  to  that  of  the  leading  position  of 
the  canton. 

Soon,  however,  opposition  began  to  develop  against 
Pietism.  The  worldly  element  in  the  Church  objected 
to  the  strict  use  of  church  discipline,  which  the  Pietists 
demanded,  and  which  the  latter  rightly  said  was  required 
by  the  Heidelberg  Catechism  in  questions  81 — 85. 
The  irreligious  element  in  the  Church  was  made 
uncomfortable  by  the  plain  preaching  of  the  Pietists 
against  their  sins.  One  of  the  Pietists,  Konig,  began 
preaching  premillenariauism,  or  the  doctrine  that  Christ 
will  come  before  the  milleuium  and  set  up  a  visible 
kingdom  on  earth  before  the  last  great  day.  This  doc- 
trine had  previously  been  regarded  as  not  Reformed. 


REV.    SAMUEL    GULDIN.  17 

As  a  result  there  was  a  reaction  against  Guldin  and  his 
party,  led  by  Bachman,  the  head  minister  of  the  Berne 
church.  Konig  was  exiled  and  Guldin  was  compelled 
to  resign  his  prominent  position,  although  he  still 
remained  a  minister  of  the  Reformed  church  of  Berne. 
In  the  course  of  time  Pietism  became  recognized  in 
Berne,  and  has  since  been  influential  there.  Its  great 
opponent,  Bachman,  died.  Konig  was  recalled  as  a 
professor  in  1730,  and  often  preached  in  the  churches, 
while  Dachs,  another  of  this  band  of  Pietists,  became 
the  head  of  the  Berne  church  in  1732.  Guldin,  how- 
ever, did  not  wait  for  this  final  vindication  of  Pietism 
there.  Deprived  of  his  position  at  the  cathedral  at 
Berne,  he  took  four  years  later  a  country  parish  at 
Boltigen.  But  he  was  not  comfortable,  nor  were  the 
state  authorities  satisfied  with  him,  and  he  was  finally 
banished.  He  then  seems  to  have  wandered  into  north- 
ern Germany,  and  finally  emigrated  to  America,  per- 
haps about  1718.  In  that  year  he  published  a  "De- 
fence of  the  Unjustly  Suspected  Pietists  of  Berne"  at 
Philadelphia.  In  America  he  found  a  wide  field  for 
preaching,  as  there  were  no  Reformed  ministers  among 
the  Germans.  We  can  see  him  with  his  evangelistic 
spirit  preaching  to  the  Reformed,  gathered  wherever  they 
could,  in  barns,  groves,  houses — anywhere,  as  they  had 
as  yet  no  churches.  And  when  their  first  church  at 
Germantown  was  erected,  he  frequently  preached  there. 


18     EAELY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

But  his  home  was  at  Oley,  in  the  eastern  part  of  Berks 
Bounty,  where  he  lived  the  life  of  a  quiet  farmer, 
preaching  as  he  had  opportunity.  He  thus  lived  qui- 
etly until  1743,  when  he  again  became  prominent  just 
before  his  death.  Count  Zinzendorf,  the  leader  of  the 
Moravians,  had  arrived  in  this  country,  and  was  trying 
to  form  a  union  denomination  among  the  Germans,  in 
which  the  Moravian  should  be  the  leading  element. 
He  began  his  work  at  Germantown  in  the  Reformed 
church  there,  and  among  the  Lutherans  in  their  con- 
gregation in  Philadelphia.  It  was  expected  that  Gul- 
din, who  had  been  a  Pietist  in  Switzerland,  would  read- 
ily sympathize  with  this  movement  to  elevate  the  piety 
of  the  Germans.  Guldin  attended  the  first  Synod  of 
that  united  body  at  Germantown  in  January,  1 742,  but 
afterwards  came  out  against  them,  very  severely  criti- 
cising their  methods.  He  declared  that  there  was 
entirely  too  much  division  among  them  ever  to  make 
much  progress.  As  a  result  there  was  a  lack  of  dis- 
tinctness in  what  they  did  believe.  For  his  part  he 
preferred  the  Heidelberg  Catechism  and  its  earnest 
irenical  spirit.  The  truth  was  that  while  Guldin  was 
a  Pietist,  he  was  not  a  fanatic,  but  a  churchly  Pietist, 
who  loved  his  Church,  his  creed,  and  highly  honored 
its  sacraments.  Guldin's  influence  carried  far  among 
a  certain  class  of  the  early  settlers,  who  were  longing 
for  more  religious  life  and  light,  and  his  warning 


REV.   SAMUEL   GULDIN.  19 

against  Zinzendorf  kept  many  of  them  back  in  their 
old  denominations.  But  while  Guldin  thus  loved  and 
honored  his  Reformed  faith  and  catechism,  he  did  not 
organize  any  churches.  In  his  book  he  makes  boast 
against  his  enemies  that  he  had  never  attempted  like 
them  to  found  a  new  sect.  He  simply  preferred  to  be 
a  plain  evangelist,  preaching  the  gospel  to  those  who 
desired  to  hear  him.  To  the  last  he  claimed  to  be 
Reformed,  although  he  loved  all  believers,  and  he 
claimed,  like  all  the  Reformed  Pietists  of  Germany,  as 
Lampe  and  Untereyck,  that  they  had  never  departed 
from  the  Reformed  faith,  but  were  true  to  its  best  and 
earliest  phase  of  piety  and  belief. 

Guldin  died  at  Philadelphia,  December  31,  1745. 
His  descendent,  Rev.  John  G.  Guldin,  was  at  one  time 
one  of  our  prominent  ministers,  and  seems  to  have 
inherited  and  revealed  the  earnest  spirit  of  his  first 
ancestor  in  America.  Rev.  Samuel  Guldin,  by  strength- 
ening the  hands  of  the  scattered  Reformed  against 
fanaticism,  and  by  ministering  to  them  in  their  desti- 
tute condition,  performed  a  valuable  work  in  pre- 
paring the  way  for  the  organization  of  our  Church,  and 
can  well  be  remembered  as  a  forerunner  of  the  Re- 
formed Church.* 

*  For  a  valuable  monograph  on   Guldin  see  Prof.  Dubb's  article  on 
Guldin,  the  Pioneer  and  Pietist,  in  the  Reformed  Church  Quarterly,   July, 

1892. 


III. 

RfcV.  JOHN  PHILIP  B(EHM. 

From  the  forerunners  of  our  Church,  like  Minuit 
and  Guldin,  we  pass  now  to  her  founders.  John  Philip 
Boehm  may  be  justly  called  the  founder  of  our  Church. 
He  came  to  this  country  about  1720  from  the  city  of 
Worms,  on  the  borders  of  the  Palatinate  in  western 
Germany.  There  he  had  been  a  Reformed  school- 
master, but  had  been  driven  out  by  the  Catholics 
because  of  his  faith.  In  1719  the  Reformed  of  the 
neighboring  Palatinate  had  to  pass  through  severe  per- 
secutions. The  Catholic  Elector  of  the  Palatinate, 
Charles  Philip,  forbade  them  to  use  their  Heidelberg 
Catechism,  and  took  from  them  their  most  important 
church  at  Heidelberg,  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Ghost. 
He  forced  them  to  observe  Catholic  feast  days,  to  bow 
before  the  host  when  it  passed  through  the  streets,  and 
to  suffer  many  other  persecutions.  Doubtless  the 
influence  of  these  persecutions  spread  to  Worms,  and 
the  Catholic  intolerance  drove  Boehm  out.  After  his 
arrival  in  America  he  became  schoolmaster  to  the  Re- 
formed who  lived  north  of  Philadelphia,  in  the  region 


EEV.    JOHN    PHILIP   BCEHM.  21 

now  called  Montgomery  county.  In  1725  the  Re- 
formed of  that  district  were  so  pleased  with  him  that 
they  came  to  him  and  asked  him  to  serve  as  their  pas- 
tor. He,  however,  held  back,  as  he  had  never  been 
ordained  to  the  ministry,  but  they  continued  their 
appeals  the  more  earnestly.  So  finally  making  a  vir- 
tue of  necessity,  as  there  were  no  Reformed  ministers 
to  be  found,  he  accepted,  "  protesting  before  God  that 
he  could  not  justify  his  refusal  of  so  necessary  a  work." 
He  at  once  began  organizing  the  Reformed  thoroughly 
into  congregations,  and  he  was  thus  the  first  to  organ- 
ize the  Reformed  in  Pennsylvania.  He  had  three  con- 
sistories elected,  in  all  three  of  the  congregations,  namely 
at  Falkner  Swamp,  Skippack  and  White  Marsh.  Of 
these  the  last  two  went  to  pieces  afterwards,  though 
revived  later.  Falkner  Swamp,  however,  remains  as 
the  oldest  Reformed  congregation  in  our  denomination. 
Bcehm's  pay  was,  as  the  Germans  say,  "  Was  fallt," 
and  as  the  settlers  were  mainly  poor,  what  fell  into  the 
collection  basket  for  the  church  was  small.  So  he  had 
to  serve  these  congregations  for  many  years  at  almost 
no  salary,  meanwhile  supporting  himself  by  working 
during  the  week  on  his  farm. 

In  1727  another  Reformed  minister,  Rev.  George 
Michael  Weiss,  arrived  from  the  Palatinate  and  began 
preaching  in  Philadelphia.     As  he  was  an   ordained 
3 


22    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

minister,  some  of  Boehm's  congregation  at  Skippack, 
led  by  Jacob  Reiff,  preferred  him  to  Bcehm.  So 
Bcehm's  congregations  took  steps  to  have  him  ordained. 
This  the  Dutch  Reformed  of  New  York,  at  the  advice 
of  the  Holland  fathers,  did  on  November  23,  1729. 
Boehm  at  this  ordination  declared  his  adherence  to  the 
Heidelberg  Catechism  and  the  Canons  of  Dort.  His 
congregations  remained  under  the  care  of  the  Holland 
Church,  and  to  it  he  sent  frequent  reports.  In  1730 
he  was  again  left  alone  in  his  work,  as  Rev.  Mr.  Weiss 
went  back  to  Europe.  As  a  result  he  had  to  take  care, 
not  merely  of  his  own  three  congregations,  but  also  of 
the  Philadelphia  congregation,  to  which  he  preached 
once  a  month.  Meanwhile  his  field  was  enlarging  west- 
ward, as  the  Germans  were  spreading  out  west  of  the 
Schuylkill,  even  to  Lancaster  county ;  and  calls  came 
to  him  from  Conestoga  to  come  and  administer  the 
sacraments.  He  went  and  administered  the  commun- 
ion to  them,  October  14,  1727,  and  found  59  members. 
Another  district,  north  of  Conestoga,  called  Tul- 
pehocken,  was  being  settled  by  the  Germans.  This 
settlement  had  been  increased  by  a  number  of  Germans 
who  came  there  from  New  York  state.  For  Queen 
Ann  of  England,  in  1708,  invited  the  poor  Palatines 
to  come  to  London,  and  they  came  in  such  numbers 
that  the  English  did  not  know  what  to  do  with  them. 


REV.    JOHN   PHILIP    BCEHM.  23 

She  sent  a  colony  of  4,000  of  them  to  New  York,  but 
they  soon  had  a  disagreement  with  the  governor  there 
and  went  farther  into  the  wilderness,  settling  in 
Schoharie  county  on  land  given  them  by  the  Indians. 
In  the  course  of  time  their  title  to  these  lands  was 
questioned,  so  a  number  of  them,  consisting  of  thirty- 
three  families,  led  by  Conrad  Weiser,  the  Indian  inter- 
preter, came  down  the  east  branch  of  the  Susquehanna, 
floating  on  rafts,  while  the  men  drove  the  cattle  along 
the  shore,  until  they  reached  the  Swatara  creek,  up 
which  they  travelled  till  they  came  to  Tulpehocken. 
To  this  German  district  Bcehm.  came,  October  18, 1727, 
and  administered  the  communion  for  the  first  time  to 
thirty-two  communicants.  He  left  these  congregations 
in  charge  of  schoolmasters,  but  regularly  twice  a  year 
he  visited  them,  to  see  how  the  work  was  prospering 
and  to  administer  the  sacraments. 

Meanwhile  his  district  continued  enlarging.  Calls 
came  to  him  to  preach  and  administer  the  sacraments 
from  the  northern  districts,  as  Macungie  and  Egypt. 
In  a  letter  of  1734  Boehrn  very  touchingly  describes 
the  pressing  needs  and  destitution  of  the  German  col- 
onists. He  says :  "A  minister  is  needed  in  Sacony, 
Macungie,  Maxatawny  and  Great  Swamp  to  feed  the 
poor  sheep  who  live  on  the  borders  of  the  wilderness, 
and  who  thirst  to  hear  God's  Word  as  the  dry  earth 


24    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

thirsts  for  water.  Some  who  were  able  to  make  the 
journey  have  at  various  times  come  all  the  way  to 
Falkner  Swamp,  a  distance  of  25  or  30  miles,  and 
brought  little  children  all  that  distance  for  baptism. 
It  wras  impossible  for  old  persons  and  weak  sick  women 
to  make  such  a  journey.  It  is,  therefore,  not  to  be 
wondered  at  that  one's  heart  breaks  and  one's  eyes  are 
full  of  tears  at  remembering  this.  Alone  I  cannot 
attend  to  all  this,  for  my  years  are  beginning  to  accu- 
mulate, and  my  poor  body  is  beginning  to  get  feeble, 
for  I  must  not  only  make  long  journeys  and  preach, 
but  also  because  these  poor  people  are  not  able  to  sup- 
port me,  I  must  by  hard  manual  labor  support  my 
large  family." 

We  do  not  know  of  any  more  pathetic  appeal  in 
the  early  history  of  our  Church  than  this  one  made  by 
Boahm  for  help.  He  was  virtually  pastor  of  all  the 
Reformed  from  the  Delaware  to  the  Susquehanna,  and 
from  Philadelphia  to  the  Blue  Mountains  (with  the 
exception,  perhaps,  of  one  or  two  small  congregations), 
a  territory  about  100  miles  square  and  containing  now 
about  eight  counties,  and  covered  now  by  seven  Re- 
formed Classes.  His  work  is  eloquently  described  by 
his  biographer,  Mr.  Henry  S.  Dotterer,  in  his  excel- 
lent monograph  :*  "  When  he  began,  in  1720,  the  Indi- 

*  See  John  Philip  Boehtn,  by  H.  S.  Dotterer. 


REV.    JOHN    PHILIP    BCEHM.  25 

ans  were  still  numerous,  having  been  little  disturbed 
by  the  sprinkling  of  white  settlers.  At  that  time  few 
lawful  roads  had  been  laid  out  for  travel,  and  he  had  to 
thread  his  toilsome  way  on  horseback  through  the  deep 
forest,  over  hills  and  across  streams,  over  rough  and 
tortuous  paths.  At  intervals  of  miles  apart  he  would 
come  upon  the  clearing  made  by  the  hardy  settler,  shel- 
tered in  a  newly  made  log  hut.  At  these  rude  fire- 
sides he  was  a  welcome  guest.  Here  he  comforted  the 
afflicted  and  homesick,  and  at  their  Sabbath  gathering 
he  brought  to  them  Gospel  blessings  denied  to  them 
since  they  left  Germany  these  many  years.  He  bap- 
tized the  children,  catechized  the  youth  and  buried  the 
dead." 

While  Boehni  was  thus  spreading  out  his  work,  so 
as  to  cover  the  field  to  its  extremest  limit,  and  to  sup- 
ply the  shepherdless  Reformed  with  the  bread  of  life, 
there  was  danger  of  a  collapse  near  the  centre  of  his 
work.  This  began  at  the  Reformed  church  at  Ger- 
mantown,  for  it,  with  the  Reformed  church  at  Goshen- 
hoppen,  had  remained  independent  of  Bcehm.  Ger- 
mantown  had  been  founded  by  the  sects,  and  as  a  result 
the  Reformed  congregation  was  affected  by  its  environ- 
ment. When  Count  Zinzeudorf,  the  leader  of  the  Mo- 
ravians, arrived  in  1741,  he  found  them  ripe  for  his 
purposes.  His  first  sermon  in  America  he  preached  in 


26    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

the  Reformed  church  at  Germantown.  Its  pastor,  Rev. 
John  Bechtel,  was  soon  after  ordained  by  a  Moravian. 
Zinzendorf's  aim  was  to  start  a  union  denomination 
among  the  Germans.  They  could  remain  Reformed  or 
Lutheran,  yet  could  be  related  to  the  Moravian  Church 
as  circles  or  tropes  of  it.  There  is  no  doubt  that  there 
was  a  great  need  (owing  to  the  great  religious  destitu- 
tion) of  gathering  the  pious  together,  no  matter  of  what 
denomination.  But  in  gathering  them  together,  Zin- 
zendorf  gathered  such  diverse  elements  that  the  union 
part  of  the  movement  soon  went  to  pieces,  and  what 
was  left  was  absorbed  by  the  Moravians,  who  had  been 
the  most  influential  in  it.  Bcehm  rose  up  to  oppose 
this  movement,  which  threatened  to  carry  into  it  con- 
gregation after  congregation  of  the  Reformed,  for  Zin- 
zendorfhad  Lischy  ordained  as  the  Swiss  Reformed 
preacher,  and  Bechtel  he  had  appointed  as  the  Reformed 
Inspector,  both  of  whom  were  especially  to  work  among 
the  Reformed,  and  win  them  from  Boehm  and  their 
Heidelberg  Catechism.  Boehm  attacked  this  move- 
ment, because  he  was  confessional — that  is,  he  believed 
in  his  own  denomination  and  creed.  He  came  into 
collision  with  Zinzeudorf,  whom  he  accused  of  insin- 
cerity— that  Zinzendorf  professed  to  be  a  Lutheran, 
when  he  was  not,  as  he  was  a  Moravian.  The  Re- 
formed in  this  union  movement  (which  was  called 


EEV.    JOHN    PHILIP    BCEHM.  27 

the  Congregation  of  God  in  the  Spirit)  made  reply. 
They  charged  that  Boehm  did  not  properly  represent 
the  Reformed,  but  only  the  Dutch  Reformed,  with 
whom  he  was  so  closely  allied,  and  who  were  high  Cal- 
vinists,  while  they  represented  the  true  German  Re- 
formed, who  were  low  Calvinists,  like  the  Reformed  at 
Berlin,  whose  minister,  Jablonsky,  had  ordained  Zin- 
zendorf  as  Bishop.  Bechtel  seems  to  have  gone  so  far 
as  to  incline  toward  perfectionism,  and  attacked  the 
114th  question  of  the  Heidelberg  Catechism.  Brehm 
attacked  them  in  two  pamphlets,  his  "  Letter  of  True 
Warning,"  August  23, 1742,  and  again  in  his  "Another 
Letter  of  Warning,"  May  19,  1743.  These  warned 
the  Reformed  against  this  new  movement.  As  a  result 
the  congregations  remained  true  to  their  old  Reformed 
faith,  although  a  number  of  individuals  went  over  to 
the  Moravians.  Even  the  congregation  at  German- 
town,  which  had  been  carried  over,  soon  tired  of  its 
pastor,  Bechtel,  and  he  had  to  resign  in  1744.  Boehm 
had  thus  saved  the  Reformed  Church  in  her  first  great 
controversy.  He  thus  proved  to  be  her  defender,  as 
well  as  her  founder  and  organizer. 

But  the  shadows  of  age  began  to  creep  over  Boahm, 
and,  as  he  says  in  the  letter  above,  he  felt  the  burden 
of  his  labors  to  be  too  heavy.  Those  upon  whom  he 
had  hoped  to  cast  the  burden  of  his  labors  failed  him. 


28    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

It  was,  therefore,  with  great  joy  and  relief  that  he 
found  two  ministers  arriving  in  Pennsylvania,  in  1746, 
to  relieve  him.  Rev.  Mr.  Weiss  returned  from  New 
York  state,  and  Rev.  Michael  Schlatter  arrived  from 
Holland,  with  instructions  from  the  Reformed  Church 
of  Holland  to  organize  the  Pennsylvania  congregations, 
so  that  they  could  be  provided  with  ministers.  The 
first  meeting  of  Bcehm,  the  aged  founder,  and  of 
Schlatter,  the  new  organizer  of  our  Church,  took 
place  at  Witpen,  September  7,  1746.  About  two 
weeks  later  Mr.  Bcehm  takes  Mr.  Schlatter  and  Mr. 
Weiss  to  visit  his  Tulpehocken  congregation,  Septem- 
ber 25,  where  these  three  administered  the  communion. 
He  gladly  relinquished  to  Mr.  Schlatter  the  congrega- 
tion at  Philadelphia  and  installed  him  as  its  pastor, 
January  1,  1747.  While  Mr.  Schlatter  travelled  up 
and  down  among  the  Reformed  settlements,  organizing 
them,  Boehm  aided  him  with  his  advice.  And  when 
the  first  Coetus  met,  September  29,  1747,  he  acted  as 
its  secretary.  He  was  very  glad  the  next  year  to  have 
three  more  Reformed  ministers  arrive,  one  of  whom, 
Mr.  Bartholomaus,  took  charge  of  his  Tulpehockeu 
congregation,  while  Mr.  Rieger  had  taken  charge  of 
his  Schsefferstown  congregation.  Rev.  Mr.  Leydich 
also  took  his  two  congregations  at  Falkner  Swamp  and 
Providence  (Trappe). 


REV.    JOHN    PHILIP    BCEHM.  29 

Boehm  now  limited  his  labors  to  the  Reformed 
around  his  home  at  Witpen  and  organized  there  a  con- 
gregation in  1746 — the  congregation  now  named  after 
him  ("Bcehm's  Church").  But  it  was  hard  work. 
The  number  was  few.  Most  of  them  were  poor.  They 
built  their  church,  but'  could  not  furnish  it.  Still  they 
labored  on  in  hope,  encouraged  by  their  aged  pastor. 

But  Bcehm's  missionary  spirit  could  not  be  re- 
strained. He  had  so  long  been  accustomed  to  travel 
great  distances  to  minister  to  shepherdless  flocks.  A  nd 
so  when  a  request  came  from  the  Macungie  and  Egypt 
congregations  at  the  beginning  of  1749,  as  they  were 
without  a  pastor,  to  come  and  supply  them,  he  could 
not  refuse  in  spite  of  his  age.  That  self-denying  zeal 
and  devotion  led  to  his  death,  for  it  was  while  at  Egypt 
to  celebrate  the  communion,  April  30,  that  he  sud- 
denly died  on  Saturday  night,  after  having  held  the 
preparatory  service. 

Bcehm  deserves  great  honor  for  his  industry,  self- 
denial  and  faithfulness  to  his  Church.  Our  Church  is 
just  beginning  to  realize  the  greatness  of  his  labors. 
For  24  years  he  preached  the  Gospel  for  almost  no  pay, 
supporting  himself  and  his  family  by  his  own  hands, 
while  all  the  time  he  underwent  great  privations,  labors 
and  suiferings  through  the  long  journeys  he  took  to  his 
congregations.  He  travelled  immense  distances,  faced 


30    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

great  dangers,  wore  out  his  health  and  strength  in  the 
service  of  our  Church,  and  died  in  the  harness.  He 
founded  and  organized  our  Church,  defended  her 
against  the  Moravians,  gave  her  her  constitution,  and 
stamped  her  character  upon  her.  He  being  dead,  yet 
speaketh.  Not  only  the  congregation  named  after  him, 
but  also  the  whole  Reformed  Church  in  the  United 
States,  is  a  monument  of  his  zeal  and  consecration. 


IV. 
EEV,  GEOEGE  MICHAEL  WEISS, 

Rev.  Mr.  Weiss  was  a  native  of  the  Palatinate,  hav- 
ing been  born  at  Stebbach,  in  the  valley  of  the  Neckar. 
He  was  educated  and  ordained  at  Heidelberg,  and  came 
to  America  in  1727.  On  September  21,  1727,  a  sloop 
named  William  and  Sarah  anchored  in  the  Delaware 
river  at  Philadelphia,  having  on  it  400  emigrants  from 
the  Palatinate  and  elsewhere  in  Germany,  headed  by 
Rev.  Mr.  Weiss.  When  they  registered,  they  solemnly 
took  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  King  George  II.  of  Great 
Britain.  Rev.  Dr.  Andrews,  pastor  of  the  Presbyte- 
rian church  of  Philadelphia  in  1730,  says  of  them  : 
"  There  is  in  this  province  a  vast  number  of  Palatines, 
and  they  come  in  still  every  year.  Those  that  have 
come  of  late  years  are  mostly  Presbyterians,  or,  as  they 
call  themselves,  Reformed.  They  did  use  to  come  to 
me  for  baptism,  and  many  have  joined  with  us  in  the 
other  sacrament.  They  never  had  a  minister  till  nine 
years  ago,  who  is  a  bright  young  man  and  a  fine 
scholar." 


32    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

The  reference  "  nine  years  ago"  has  been  hard  to 
explain.  Dr.  Weiser  says  it  refers  to  Boehm's  preach- 
ing in  Philadelphia,  but  that  is  not  correct.  Mr.  J.  T. 
Sachse,  in  some  recent  evidence  he  has  found,  claims 
that  his  arrival  in  1727  was  Mr.  Weiss'  second  trip  to 
America,  and  that  his  first  trip  occurred  about  eight 
years  before.  It  is  a  difficult  question. 

Mr.  Weiss,  finding  that  the  Reformed  people  of 
Philadelphia  were  poor  and  unable  to  support  a  min- 
ister, offered  himself  as  teacher  of  logic  and  metaphys- 
ics. The  Philadelphia  Mercury  of  February  3,  1729, 
contains  the  following : 

"  This  is  to  give  notice  that  the  subscriber  hereof, 
being  desirous  to  be  as  generally  useful  as  he  can  in 
this  country  (wherein  he  is  a  stranger),  declares  his 
willingness  to  teach  Logic,  Natural  Philosophy,  Meta- 
physics, etc.,  to  all  such  as  are  willing  to  learn.  The 
place  of  teaching  will  be  at  the  widow  Sprogel's,  on 
Second  street,  where  he  will  attend,  if  he  has  encour- 
agement, three  times  a  week  for  that  exercise. 

"  Signed  by  G.  M., 
"  Minister  of  the  Reformed  Palatinate  Church." 

Mr.  Weiss  had  a  curious  difficulty  with  some  of 
these  Germans.  He  came  over,  bringing  with  him  his 
ordination  certificate  in  Latin.  As  the  plain  country 
Germans  could  not  read  that  classic  language,  they 


REV.    GEORGE   MICHAEL   WEISS.  33 

looked  with  some  suspicion  upon  it,  as  if  Mr.  Weiss 
were  a  pretender  to  the  ministry  and  not  a  real  min- 
ister. We  can  excuse  them  for  this,  for  they  had  had 
a  number  of  wolves  in  sheep's  clothing  get  into  their 
congregations  under  false  pretences.  So  he  wrote  back 
to  the  Palatinate  for  a  certificate  in  German.  This  was 
sent,  dated  at  Heidelberg,  April  26,  1728,  and  signed 
by  the  prominent  Reformed  minister  there,  L.  C.  Mieg. 
It  says  of  Mr.  Weiss  :  "  We  testify,  as  we  did  before, 
that  he  is  not  only  right-minded  in  doctrine  and  un- 
blamable in  life,  peace-loving  and  sociable  in  his  walk 
and  conversation,  but  also  edifying  in  his  manifold 
discourses  preached  before  us.  We  have  no  doubt  but 
that,  if  the  Lord  grant  him  life  and  health,  he  will 
prove  useful  and  be  the  means  of  edifying  many  souls." 

Mr.  Weiss  seems  to  have  seen  the  danger  that  was 
coming  to  the  Germans  in  America  from  the  sects, 
because  the  churches  had  so  few  ministers.  So  he  pub- 
lished the  first  work  issued  by  any  of  our  ministers  : 
"  The  Minister  in  the  American  Wilderness,"  etc. 
(1729).  It  was  a  booklet  of  29  pages,  and  was  directed 
against  a  sect  called  the  "  New  Born,"  who  seem  to 
have  claimed  themselves  to  be  sinless. 

But  Mr.  Weiss'  influence  and  activity  did  not  stop 
with  Philadelphia.  Some  of  his  friends  and  fellow 
travellers,  among  whom  were  the  Hillegas  family,  had 


34    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

settled  up  the  Perkiomeu  valley,  above  Skippack. 
Through  them  he  came  into  contact  with  Jacob  Reiff, 
the  prominent  elder  of  Bcehm's  congregation  at  Skip- 
pack.  As  Boehm  was  not  an  ordained  minister  as  yet, 
Reiff  and  his  friends  at  Skippack  took  sides  against 
him,  preferring  Weiss,  who  was  an  ordained  minister 
and  a  scholar.  As  a  result  there  was  friction  between 
Boehm  and  Weiss.  The  three  congregations  of  Boehm 
took  measures  to  rectify  the  matter.  They  applied  to 
the  Dutch  Reformed  ministers  of  New  York  for  ordi- 
nation for  Mr.  Boehm.  The  latter,  at  the  request  of 
the  Holland  fathers,  ordained  Mr.  Boehm,  November 
23,  1729.  After  this,  Boehm  and  Weiss  were  recon- 
ciled, but  their  reconciliation  did  not  bring  back  the 
disaffected  at  Skippack  to  Bcehm,  although  the  Classis 
of  Amsterdam  in  Holland  urged  them  to  do  so.  On 
the  contrary,  the  followers  of  Reiff  built  a  small  wooden 
church  for  service  there,  right  on  Reift's  property,  and 
the  latter  would  not  allow  Bcehm  to  preach  in  it.  As 
a  result  of  this  unhappy  strife  at  Skippack,  the  con- 
gregation ultimately  went  to  pieces,  although  afterwards 
revived  by  Leydich.  Weiss  through  this  became  quite 
intimate  with  Reiff,  and  as  Reiff  determined  to  go  to 
Europe,  Weiss  decided  to  accompany  him.  They  left 
in  1729,  bearing  instructions  from  the  Reformed  con- 
gregations at  Philadelphia  and  Skippack  to  raise  funds 


REV.    GEORGE   MICHAEL   WEISS.  35 

for  them.  Mr.  Weiss'  arrival  in  Holland  created  con- 
siderable interest.  The  churches,  especially  of  the 
South  Holland  Synod,  became  interested  in  the  matter, 
and  they  drew  up  a  report,  which  was  probably  gotten 
up  after  conference  with  Mr.  Weiss,  "  that  in  Pennsyl- 
vania there  are  about  30,000  Germans,  of  whom  half 
are  Reformed  ;  that  they  are  without  ministers  and 
greatly  need  churches,  especially  at  Skippack."  (Reiff 
probably  pressed  the  claims  of  Skippack.)  Weiss  never 
seems  to  be  able  to  say  anything  about  the  new  world, 
but  he  has  to  speak  of  the  Indians,  and  so  in  this  report 
occurs  the  following  :  "A  ground  of  hope  is  found  in 
the  fact  as  to  the  nature  and  disposition  of  the  aborigi- 
nes of  the  land.  They  are  right  in  their  conduct,  faith- 
ful to  their  word,  and  are  particularly  friendly  to  the 
Palatinate  Germans  dwelling  among  them.  These  Ger- 
mans, having  themselves  been  subjected  to  oppression, 
are  familiar  with  them  and  friendly  to  them,  allowing 
them  to  lodge  in  their  barns  at  night,  finding  them 
protection  from  the  cold  and  rain  by  their  firesides, 
granting  them  to  sow  their  grain  within  their  bound- 
aries, thus  freeing  them  from  the  wild  horse  which 
otherwise  consumed  their  grain.  By  this  means  the 
good  will  and  confidence  of  the  Indians  has  been  so  far 
gained  that  the  Palatines  can  travel  free  and  without 
hindrance  through  that  land,  and  be  conducted  and 


36    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

escorted  by  the  Indians  and  furnished  by  them  with 
food  ;  while  they  feel  injured  if  payment  should  be 
offered  to  them  for  it.  What  may  not  be  hoped  for 
when  a  popular  ministry  shall  be  instituted  among 
them  and  the  Gospel  preached  to  them  ?" 

The  favorable  action  of  this  Synod  was  emphasized 
by  an  event  that  took  place  when  the  next  Synod  of 
South  Holland  met  at  Dort,  Eight  hundred  Palatines 
passed  through  the  place  to  take  ship  at  Rotterdam  for 
America.  The  whole  Synod  in  a  body  visited  them, 
and  furnished  them  with  medicines  and  provisions. 
After  Christian  exhortation,  prayer  and  singing,  they 
were  dismissed  with  the  assurance  that  the  Synod  of 
Holland  would  not  forget  them  in  their  new  abode. 
This  action  of  the  Synod  and  the  appeals  of  Mr.  Weiss 
created  widespread  interest,  and  a  considerable  amount 
of  money  was  raised.  Weiss  returned  to  America  in 
1731,  but  Reiff  remained  abroad  a  year  longer.  As 
Reiff  was  the  custodian  of  the  money  collected,  suspi- 
cion was  raised  against  Weiss  on  his  return.  He,  how- 
ever, was  innocent,  for  it  was  Reiff  who  held  the  money, 
so  that  the  needy  congregations  got  nothing  of  it  till 
1 746,  when  Mr.  Schlatter  had  Reiff  settle  the  claim  by 
paying  over  about  650  dollars. 

Mr.  Weiss,  in  the  meantime,  left  Pennsylvania  and 
went  to  New  York  state,  where  he  became  pastor  at 


REV.    GEORGE   MICHAEL   WEISS.  37 

Khinebeck  and  Burnetsfielcl,  for  there  were  a  large 
number  of  German  Reformed  in  New  York  state  who 
afterward  became  part  of  the  Dutch  Reformed  Church. 
While  there  he  continued  his  interest  in  the  Indians. 
He  preached  to  the  Indians  through  an  interpreter, 
baptized  a  number  of  them,  and  ten  years  later  speaks 
of  having  brought  many  of  them  to  Christ.  He  wrote 
a  description  of  them  to  the  Holland  fathers  and  sent  a 
picture  of  them  to  Holland.  But  the  depredations  of 
the  Indians  in  the  Mohawk  region  compelled  him  to 
think  of  looking  for  a  safer  place  of  abode.  So  he 
longed  to  come  again  to  Pennsylvania.  In  1742  he 
expressed  a  willingness  to  return  to  Pennsylvania,  if  a 
congregation  were  open  to  him. 

It  was,  however,  not  until  1746  that  Mr.  Weiss 
returned  to  Pennsylvania,  and  became  pastor  of  the 
Goshenhoppen  and  Great  Swamp  congregations.  Mr. 
Schlatter  arrived  soon  after  in  Pennsylvania,  and  was 
warmly  welcomed  by  Mr.  Weiss,  who  aided  him  by 
his  advice  and  sympathy.  Into  the  organization  of  the 
Coetus  he  entered  heartily,  and  was  present  both  at  the 
preliminary  meeting  in  1746  and  at  the  first  Coetus  in 
1747.  For  some  reason  he  was  not  present  at  the  sec- 
ond Coetus  in  1748.  He  was  president  of  the  Coetus 
of  1750.  But  after  Mr.  Steiner's  dispute  with  Mr. 
Schlatter  in  Philadelphia,  he  at  last  became  estranged 
4 


38    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

from  Mr.  Schlatter  and  joined  the  opposition  to  him. 
He  was  much  pained  at  the  division  in  the  Coetus,  and 
proposed  (1752)  a  new  constitution  for  the  Coetus, 
which  he  drafted  and  sent  to  the  Holland  fathers,  but 
it  was  never  adopted.  When  Mr.  Schlatter  and  Mr. 
Steiner  became  reconciled  in  1753,  he  again  became 
active  in  the  Coetus,  and  ever  after  was  one  of  its  pillars. 
Mr.  Weiss'  health  began  to  give  way  by  1759,  so 
that  he  was  often  excused  from  attendance  at  the  Coetus. 
He  died  in  1762,  some  time  before  the  Coetus  met, 
which  was  on  June  30.  From  the  will  of  his  wife, 
made  in  1765,  we  find  that  he  must  have  been  a  man 
of  some  means,  and  was  the  owner  of  negro  slaves, 
whom  he  had  baptized  into  the  Reformed  faith,  and 
whom  she  liberated  by  her  will.  Tradition,  says  Rev. 
Dr.  Weiser,  has  it  that  the  will  was  not  carried  out, 
and  the  slaves  were  sold.  But  a  strange  fatality  set  in. 
One  by  one  they  died  on  the  hands  of  their  new  owners. 
The  master  of  a  slave  girl  in  Germantown,  hearing  of 
this  fatality,  became  alarmed  and  brought  her  in  a  car- 
riage to  the  neighborhood,  and  after  selling  the  negro- 
land,  which  properly  fell  to  her,  to  Peter  Hillegass,  its 
former  owner,  he  handed  the  proceeds  to  the  girl  and 
liberated  her.  The  tract  was  long  known  as  the  negro- 
land. 


EEV.    GEORGE   MICHAEL   WEISS.  39 

Father  Weiss'  memory  still  lingers  in  the  Goshen- 
hoppen  congregation.  Just  outside  of  the  New  Goshen- 
hoppen  church  is  his  tombstone,  on  which  is  the  inscrip- 
tion in  German  :  "  Here  rests  Rev.  George  Michael 
Weiss."  And  he  is  remembered  not  only  by  that 
charge,  but  by  the  whole  Reformed  Church  as  one  of 
her  earliest  fathers  and  founders. 


V. 
EEV.  MICHAEL  SCHLATTER, 

If  Mr.  Boehm  was  the  founder  of  our  Church,  Mr. 
Schlatter  completed  the  organization  by  calling  together 
the  first  Coetus,  September  29,  1747,  at  Philadelphia, 
whose  sesqui-centennial  we  celebrate  this  year. 

Rev.  Mr.  Schlatter  was  born  at  St.  Gall,  Switzer- 
land, July  14, 1716.  His  father  kept  a  bookstore,  and 
belonged  to  a  family  long  prominent  in  that  city,  one 
of  them  having  been  dekan  or  leading  minister  of  the 
canton  in  1715.  Since  the  days  of  the  Reformation 
there  have  been  two  main  families  of  Schlatters  there, 
from  one  of  which  was  descended  the  sweet  poetess  of 
Switzerland,  Anna  Schlatter,  and  also  the  great  Re- 
formed pulpit  orator  of  the  last  century,  Zollikoffer  of 
Leipzic,  whose  mother  was  a  Schlatter.  From  the 
other  family  came  our  Michael  Schlatter.  There  Mich- 
ael went  to  the  cantonal  school  and  attended  the  gym- 
nasium under  the  care  of  the  famous  teacher,  Barthol- 
omew Wegelin.  He  was  possessed  of  a  roving  disposi- 
tion and  left  home  for  a  while,  wandering  to  Germany 
in  company  with  a  young  man  from  Berne  named 


REV.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  41 

Hiirner.  It  is  said  he  went  to  Helmstadt,  but  prob- 
ably not  to  study.  This  roving  disposition  God  after- 
wards utilized  to  bring  him  to  America  to  do  His  work 
in  organizing  our  Church.  Returning  to  St.  Gall,  he 
continued  his  studies,  and  was  licensed  as  a  minister, 
April  10,  1739.  As  positions  were  hard  to  get  by 
young  ministers,  he  acted  as  tutor  for  a  while,  and  so 
went  to  Holland,  where  he  was  engaged  as  a  private 
tutor.  He  returned  to  Switzerland,  and  in  1744  be- 
came vicar  or  assistant  to  dekan  (or  superintendent) 
Beyel  at  Wigoldiugen,  in  the  neighboring  canton  of 
Thurgau.  Here  he  remained  but  a  short  time,  for  by 
August  17,  1745,  he  had  returned  to  St.  Gall  and 
become  evening  preacher  at  the  church  at  Linzebiihl, 
the  southern  suburb  of  St.  Gall ;  that  is,  he  was  assist- 
ant preacher  there,  preaching  on  Sunday  afternoon, 
while  the  principal  minister  preached  in  the  morning. 
The  church  still  stands  as  it  was  then.  (We  have  a 
picture  of  it  as  it  existed  in  the  last  century.)  It  is  a 
small  plain  church,  with  rough  benches  for  seats,  with 
no  carpet,  and  with  only  a  pulpit  and  baptismal  font 
as  furniture.  Here,  however,  he  continued  only  five 
mouths,  for  on  January  9,  1746,  he  suddenly  left  and 
went  to  Holland,  stopping  at  Heidelberg  on  the  way. 
The  Classis  of  Amsterdam  had  just  been  looking  for 
some  one  to  send  to  America  to  superintend  the  organi- 


42    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

zation  of  the  German  churches  of  Pennsylvania,  and 
so  the  deputies  there,  who  had  charge  of  the  matter, 
appointed  him,  May  23,  1746,  instructing  him  to 
travel  through  the  German  districts  and  find  out  what 
each  congregation  would  give  to  support  a  minister, 
and  also  to  organize  them  into  a  Coetus  (or  Synod)  sub- 
ject to  the  Reformed  Church  of  Holland,  which  would 
then  support  them.  By  June  1  he  had  sailed  for 
America,  where  he  landed  two  months  later  at  Boston, 
although  on  July  24,  while  off  Cape  Breton,  he  was 
very  near  being  shipwrecked  on  Sable  Island.  After 
remaining  a  short  time  in  New  York  city,  in  confer- 
ence with  the  Dutch  Reformed  ministers  there,  he 
arrived  at  Philadelphia,  September  6,'  1746,  and  was 
gladly  received  by  the  Reformed  congregation  there, 
one  of  whose  elders  entertained  him  at  his  house  for  a 
long  time.  Immediately  he  began  his  missionary  jour- 
neys, which  were  remarkable  for  their  length  and  con- 
tinuance. He  said  in  his  appeal  issued  afterward,  in 
1751,  that  he  had  travelled  8,000  miles  in  America. 
He  at  once  visited  Mr.  Boehm  at  Witpen.  The  next 
week  he  visited  Mr.  Dorstius,  the  pastor  of  the  Dutch 
Reformed  congregation  at  Neshaminy,  Pa.  The  week 
following  he  visited  Mr.  Weiss  at  Goshenhoppen,  and 
settled  up  the  accounts  with  Jacob  Reiff,  who  paid  him 
about  $650  or  $700  as  the  result  of  the  collection  made 


REV.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  43 

in  Europe  in  1731.  Then,  together  with  Messrs. 
Bcehm  and  Weiss,  he  went  to  Tulpehocken,  where  they 
together  administered  the  communion  on  September 
25,  when  the  people  wept  at  seeing  so  many  Reformed 
ministers  together,  a  sight  they  had  not  seen  since  leav- 
ing the  fatherland  many  years  before.  On  October  12 
he  had  a  friendly  conference  at  Philadelphia  with 
Bcehm,  Weiss  and  Rieger.  For  a  year  he  continued 
these  missionary  journeys,  visited  the  scattered  Re- 
formed, organizing  them  into  congregations,  and  find- 
ing out  how  much  each  congregation  would  give  for 
the  support  of  a  minister.  He  also  became  pastor  of 
the  Philadelphia  congregation,  and  was  installed  over 
it  by  Rev.  Mr.  Boehm,  December  21,  1746,  and  over 
the  Germantown  congregation,  February  15,  1747. 
He,  however,  declined  to  receive  any  salary  for  the 
first  year. 

The  first  Coetus,  whose  sesqui-centennial  we  cele- 
brate this  year,  met  at  the  Reformed  church  in  Phila- 
delphia, September  29,  1747.  Four  ministers  were 
present — Boehm,  Weiss,  Rieger  and  Schlatter.  There 
were  twenty-seven  elders  present  from  twelve  charges, 
as  follows  :  Philadelphia,  Falkner  Swamp,  Providence 
and  Witpen,  Old  Goshenhoppen  and  Great  Swamp, 
Schseffer's  church  and  Erlentown,  Tulpehocken,  Indian- 
field,  Springfield,  Blue  Mountain  and  Egypt,  Little 


44    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

Lehigh,  Sacony,  and  York.  Lancaster  was  not  repre- 
sented. Of  those  present  none  of  the  ministers  have 
any  descendents  in  our  ministry  as  far  as  we  know, 
and  only  two  of  the  elders  probably  have  descendents 
in  Rev.  Mr.  Ranck  of  Mechanicsburg  and  Rev.  Mr. 
Wotring  of  Nazareth.  The  Coetus  approved  the 
instructions  of  the  Holland  fathers  to  Mr.  Schlatter, 
and  also  his  work  in  organizing  the  congregations. 
They  appointed  him  to  write  the  report  of  their  pro- 
ceedings to  the  Holland  fathers,  and  to  ask  them  for 
the  ministers  necessary  for  the  vacant  charges.  They 
appointed  a  committee  to  look  into  the  case  of  Mr. 
I>ischy,  who  had  been  a  Moravian,  but  who  wanted  to 
come  back  to  the  Reformed.  And  they  ordered  the 
money  collected  by  Mr.  Boehm  to  be  given  to  the  new 
congregation  at  Witpeu,  as  the  church  at  Skippack,  for 
which  it  had  been  collected,  had  gone  to  pieces. 

After  the  Coetus  Mr.  Schlatter  continued  his  mis- 
sionary journeys  for  another  year,  besides  acting  as 
pastor  of  the  congregations  at  Philadelphia  and  •  Ger- 
mantown.  In  1748  the  second  Coetus  met  at  Phila- 
delphia, September  29.  Mr.  Boehm,  who  had  been  the 
secretary  the  year  before,  was  made  president,  and 
Mr.  Rieger  was  made  secretary.  Three  new  young 
ministers  joined  the  Coetus — Leydich,  Bartholomaus 
and  Hochreutiner.  This  Coetus  is,  perhaps,  the  most 


REV.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  45 

important,  for  it  adopted  the  creed  of  the  Church  and 
its  constitution.  All  the  ministers  signed  an  agree- 
ment to  hold  to  the  Heidelberg  Catechism  and  the 
Canons  of  Dort,  thus  making  the  Church  strongly  Cal- 
vinistic.  Mr.  Rieger  was  the  only  one  who  objected 
to  this,  but  he  subsequently,  at  the  Coetus  of  1752, 
also  signed  the  Canons  of  Dort,  so  that  all  the  early 
ministers  were  Calvinistic.  The  Coetus  also  adopted, 
as  its  constitution,  the  congregational  constitution  drawn 
up  by  Mr.  Bcehm  in  1725  for  his  three  congregations 
of  Falkner  Swamp,  Skippack  and  White  Marsh  ;  also 
adding  certain  other  rules  of  order  to  it. 

Mr.  Schlatter  continued  his  labors  at  Philadelphia 
and  Germantown  after  the  Coetus,  but  was  greatly  sad- 
dened by  the  sudden  death  of  Rev.  Mr.  Hochreutiner 
at  Philadelphia,  just  as  this  young  minister  was  about 
starting  to  enter  on  his  congregation  at  Lancaster  (his 
gun  accidentally  discharged,  killing  him).  But  he  was 
somewhat  comforted  at  the  end  of  October  by  the 
arrival  of  two  new  Dutch  Reformed  students  for  the 
ministry,  DuBois  and  Marinus,  ready  to  enter  upon 
the  work  in  America. 

On  September  27,  1747,  the  third  Coetus  was 
opened  at  Lancaster,  but  it  did  not  complete  its  business, 
as  during  its  sessions  word  came  that  a  new  minister 
had  arrived  in  Philadelphia,  Rev.  John  Conrad  Stei- 


46     EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

ner,  from  Switzerland,  with  letters  from  the  Holland 
fathers.  So  they  adjourned  to  meet  October  20,  at 
Philadelphia,  and  act  on  the  instructions  of  those  let- 
ters. When  the  Coetus  met,  Mr.  Steiner's  sickness 
prevented  his  attendance  at  the  Coetus,  but  Mr.  Schlat- 
ter  placed  in  his  hand  a  call  from  the  congregation  at 
Lancaster.  However,  before  Mr.  Steiner's  arrival  in 
America  there  had  been  a  party  formed  in  the  Phila- 
delphia congregation  against  Mr.  Schlatter.  The  rea- 
son of  this  opposition  to  Mr.  Schlatter  was  not  opposi- 
tion to  the  supervision  of  the  Dutch  and  their  high 
Calvinism,  but  it  was  due  to  other  causes.  That  it 
was  not  due  to  that  cause,  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  they 
afterwards  chose  Mr.  Steiner  as  their  pastor,  yet  Mr. 
Steiner  was  sent  over  by  those  same  Holland  fathers. 
This  dissatisfied  element  joined  itself  to  Mr.  Steiner 
(who  was  a  considerably  older  man  than  Mr.  Schlatter, 
and  who  had  already  won  considerable  literary  reputa- 
tion in  his  native  country),  and  asked  him  to  become 
pastor.  This  produced  a  division  in  the  congregation, 
and  at  a  congregational  election  the  adherents  of  Mr. 
Steiner  outvoted  those  of  Mr.  Schlatter.  The  matter 
was  referred  to  arbiters,  who  decided  that  the  church 
belonged  to  the  Schlatter  party,  and  also  decided  that 
Mr.  Schlatter  was  innocent  of  all  the  charges  that  the 
Steiner  party  brought  against  him.  Mr.  Steiner's  party 


REV.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  47 

then  withdrew  and  formed  another  congregation.  Mr. 
Schlatter  continued  preaching  in  the  old  church,  and 
also  visiting  the  different  congregations. 

On  November  16, 1750,  the  fourth  Coetus  was  held. 
The  outlook  for  church  affairs  was  not  very  hopeful. 
Of  the  sixteen  charges  only  six  had  ministers,  while 
thirty-two  congregations  were  without  pastors.  Besides, 
the  interchange  of  letters  with  Holland  was  not  regu- 
lar, many  letters  being  belated  or  lost.  So  an  extra 
session  of  Coetus  was  held,  December  13,  when  it  was 
decided  that  it  was  necessary  that  some  one  from  Penn- 
sylvania should  go  to  Holland  and  in  person  lay  their 
condition  before  the  Holland  fathers,  and  get  from 
them  aid  and  ministers.  Mr.  Schlatter  was  chosen  to 
do  this,  and  Messrs.  Weiss,  Leydich  and  Lischy  agreed 
to  supply  the  Philadelphia  congregation  with  preach- 
ing during  his  absence.  Schlatter  sailed  from  New 
Castle,  Delaware,  February  5,  1751,  and  arrived  at 
England,  March  11,  and  at  Holland,  April  12. 

He  happened  to  arrive  just  in  the  nick  of  time,  for 
the  Classis  of  Amsterdam  met  shortly  after,  May  3. 
He  laid  before  them  the  sad,  destitute  condition  of  the 
Pennsylvania  churches,  and  also  made  a  full  statement 
of  his  difficulties  in  Philadelphia  with  Mr.  Steiner. 
The  Classis  cleared  him  in  the  latter  case,  and  ordered 
him  to  draft  an  appeal  to  the  churches.  This  appeal, 


48    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

together  with  his  journal,  endorsed  by  the  deputies, 
was  ordered  to  be  printed  and  circulated.  It  was 
printed  in  Dutch,  German  and  English.*  This  appeal 
soon  began  to  bear  fruit  in  Holland,  as  money  began  to 
coine  in  for  the  destitute  German  churches  in  America. 
The  states  of  Holland  and  West  Friesland  voted  2,000 
guilders  for  five  years.  At  the  request  of  the  Synod, 
Mr.  Schlatter  went  to  Germany  and  Switzerland.  The 
Palatinate  church,  although  so  poor  and  oppressed, 
raised  300  guilders  for  its  children  in  Pennsylvania. 
And  some  of  the  Swiss  cantons  gave  something.  The 
whole  amount  raised  was  $00,000,  whose  interest  was 
to  be  yearly  applied  to  the  Pennsylvania  churches. 

But  best  of  all,  especially  through  the  influence  of 
Prof.  Arnoldi  of  the  University  of  Herborn,  six  young 
ministers  decided  to  come  with  him  to  America  to 
preach  the  Gospel  in  the  vacant  charges.  He  sailed 
from  Europe  in  March,  1752,  and  arrived  in  America, 
July  28  of  that  year.  The  coming  of  so  many  young 
men,  together  with  the  report  of  his  success  in  the  rais- 
ing of  money  in  Europe,  led  to  a  large  attendance  at 
the  Coetus  of  1752,  Steiner  alone  being  absent.  But  it 
was  soon  evident  that  there  was  not  entire  unity  amo^g 
the  brethren.  One  of  the  young  ministers  whom  Mr. 

*  For  a  full  text  of  the  appeal,  see  Harbaugh's  Life  of  Schlatter,  pages 
84—234. 


KEY.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  49 

Sch latter  brought  had  been  called  to  the  congregation 
at  Philadelphia,  in  place  of  Mr.  Schlatter.  He  was 
called  by  the  Coetus  "  the  rebellious  Rubel."  He  did 
not  prove  at  all  wise  or  safe,  but  in  his  call  to  Phila- 
delphia he  was  largely  the  creature  of  circumstances. 
All  this  made  Mr.  Schlatter's  position  rather  uncom- 
fortable. He  had  no  place  where  to  employ  his  pas- 
toral gifts,  except  the  little  congregation  at  Witpen, 
left  vacant  by  Mr.  Boehm's  death.  Later  he  began 
preaching  in  Philadelphia,  at  the  request  of  the  Coetus, 
as  there  were  some  in  the  congregation  who  remained 
loyal  to  him.  But  there  was  a  growing  opposition  to 
him  in  the  Coetus,  led  by  Weiss  and  Leydich,  while 
Steiner  and  Rubel  with  their  congregations  held  abso- 
lutely aloof  from  the  Coetus.  However,  late  in  1753 
Steiner  and  Schlatter  became  reconciled,  and  that  healed 
the  trouble,  while  Mr.  Rubel,  some  years  after,  was 
ordered  by  the  Holland  fathers  to  give  up  the  Phila- 
delphia congregation,  and  he  left  Pennsylvania. 

But  a  new  field  of  labor  was  opening  up  to  Mr. 
Schlatter.  It  seemed  as  if  his  work  in  the  Coetus  had 
been  accomplished  by  its  organization  and  the  raising 
of  so  much  money  for  it  in  Europe.  His  visit  to  Eu- 
rope, however,  had  called  the  attention  of  the  English 
people  to  the  Germans  of  Pennsylvania.  Rev.  Dr. 
Thompson,  pastor  of  the  English  Reformed  church  at 


50    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

Amsterdam,  had  translated  his  appeal  into  English 
and  visited  England  in  its  interest.  As  a  result,  the 
English  and  Scotch  raised  a  fund  of  $100,000,  the  king 
himself  giving  $5,000  toward  the  amount.  In  the 
memorials  to  the  English  people  the  destitute  condition 
of  the  Germans  was  greatly  magnified,  and  fear  was 
expressed  lest  Pennsylvania  might  become  a  German 
province  rather  than  an  English  one,  and  that  in  the 
event^of  war  it  might  ally  itself  with  the  French  of 
Canada  against  the  English.  This  political  reason,  as 
well  as  pity  for  the  poor  Palatines,  led  the  English  to 
open  their  hearts  and  purses  in  this  large  fund,  which 
was  to  be  devoted  to  the  organization  of  charity  schools 
among  the  Germans. 

The  attention  of  this  English  society  was  called  to 
Mr.  Schlatter  as  the  person  best  suited  to  take  charge 
of  their  schools  in  Pennsylvania.  So  they  elected  him, 
and  he  became  the  first  school  superintendent  of  Penn- 
sylvania. He,  therefore,  presented  the  resignation  of 
his  congregation  to  the  Holland  fathers.  He  sailed  for 
Europe,  November,  1753,  to  do  so,  and  returned  Sep- 
tember 28,  1754.  The  Coetus  of  1755,  however,  still 
retained  him  as  a  member,  and  requested  him  to  act  as 
Visitor  for  the  Coetus  ;  and  asked,  that  while  attending 
to  his  duties  as  superintendent  of  the  charity  schools, 
he  should  care  for  the  Reformed.  The  Reformed  were 


EEV.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  51 

at  first  kindly  disposed  to  these  charity  schools,  and  the 
Coetus  of  1755  recommended  Messrs.  Otterbein  and 
Stoy  as  district  superintendents.  But  the  Germans, 
especially  through  the  influence  of  Mr.  Saur,  the  editor 
of  the  paper  which  circulated  most  among  the  Ger- 
mans, became  prejudiced  against  the  scheme  because  of 
the  reflections  it  cast  on  the  Germans  as  being  illiterate. 
The  charity  scheme  ultimately  failed,  although  out  of 
it  came  finally  what  afterwards  became  the  University 
of  Pennsylvania. 

In  1756  a  breach  occurred  between  Mr.  Schlatter 
and  the  Coetus.  That  Coetus  charged  him  with  report- 
ing to  Holland  things  not  mentioned  in  the  acts  of  the 
previous  Coetus,  and  even  charged  him  with  "  what 
looked  like  fraud"  in  making  that  report.  We  do  not 
know  what  the  matters  referred  to  were,  as  the  letter 
referred  to  is  not  yet  found,  but  the  matter  was  suffi- 
cient to  cause  Mr.  Schlatter  to  leave  the  Coetus  and 
never  to  come  near  it  afterward.  This  was  unfortunate 
in  many  respects.  For  it  deprived  the  Coetus  of  his 
excellent  executive  abilities  and  wonderful  energy  ;  and 
it  also  deprived  him  of  the  honor  he  would  have  had 
from  the  Coetus  as  its  founder.  Still,  after  his  depart- 
ure matters  moved  on  peaceably  in  the  Coetus,  and 
there  may  have  been  a  providence  in  it  after  all. 


52    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

In  1757  Mr.  Schlatter  was  appointed  chaplain  of 
the  German  troops  in  the  British  army,  who  marched 
against  the  French  in  the  seige  of  Louisbnrg  and  Hali- 
fax. Bancroft,  the  historian,  speaking  of  the  chaplains 
of  that  expedition,  said :  "  There  were  the  chaplains, 
who  preached  to  the  regiments  of  citizen  soldiers,  a 
renewal  of  the  days  when  Moses  with  the  rod  of  God 
in  his  hand  sent  Joshua  against  Amelek."  After  Mr. 
Schlatter's  return  from  Nova  Scotia  he  resided  at  Chest- 
nut Hill,  calling  his  residence  "  Sweetland."  Here  he 
lived  quietly  until  the  American  revolution  broke  out. 
He  seems  at  times  to  have  preached  to  the  Reformed 
of  that  vicinity,  who  would  come  together  to  worship 
in  the  church  at  Barren  Hill. 

Rev.  Mr.  Muhlenberg  says  in  the  Halle  Reports  : 
"On  Easter  Monday,  April  12,  1762,  Rev.  Mr.  Schlat- 
ter also  came  and  had  an  appointment  made  after  my 
sermon  to  administer  the  holy  supper  to  some  Re- 
formed members.  After  my  sermon  Mr.  Schlatter  yet 
added  a  short  exhortation,  still  further  impressing  upon 
their  hearts  what  they  had  heard.  After  this  he  went 
with  his  church  members  into  the  union  school  house, 
where  he  administered  the  holy  supper." 

Dr.  Harbaugh,  in  his  biography  of  Mr.  Schlatter, 
tells  the  story  that  it  was  customary  in  those  days  for 
the  female  worshippers  at  Barren  Hill  to  wear  short 


REV.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  53 

gowns  and  neat  aprons.  When  Mr.  Schlatter  preached, 
as  he  walked  up  the  aisle  to  the  pulpit,  which  he  always 
did  in  a  hurried  manner,  he  would  suddenly  stop,  and, 
without  saying  a  word,  seize  one  of  these  clean  aprons 
and  wipe  the  dust  off  his  glasses  which  he  carried  in 
his  hands.  However,  this  congregation  never  stood  in 
connection  with  the  Coetus,  so  that  Mr.  Schlatter  was 
really  an  independent  Reformed  minister  for  thirty- 
four  years,  never  attending  Coetus  in  all  that  time. 
When  the  revolution  broke  out,  he  sided  with  the  patri- 
ots. And  when  the  British  captured  Philadelphia,  it 
placed  him  in  a  dangerous  position.  For  he  had  been 
chaplain  of  the  British  army,  and  does  not  seem  to  have 
resigned,  for  he  signed  himself  as  British  army  chap- 
lain as  late  as  1762  in  a  marriage  certificate.  He  was, 
therefore,  soon  arrested  by  the  British,  taken  to  Phila- 
delphia and  imprisoned.  He  was,  however,  cheered  in 
prison  by  his  daughter  Rachel,  who  would  ride  into 
Philadelphia  on  horseback,  bringing  provisions  for  him. 
The  British,  during  his  imprisonment,  plundered  his 
house  at  Chestnut  Hill.  His  daughter  Rachel,  at  the 
risk  of  her  life,  seized  the  portrait  of  her  father,  which 
was  hanging  on  the  wall,  snatching  it  out  of  the  hand 
of  a  British  soldier  who  was  at  the  time  reaching  for 
it,  and  carried  it  away  with  the  fleetness  of  a  deer. 
The  soldiers  wantonly  destroyed  all  they  could  find, 
5 


54    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

burning  his  valuable  papers,  strewing  feather  beds  to 
the  winds  and  throwing  his  silver  into  the  well.  After 
he  was  set  free  from  the  prison,  he  returned  to  Chest- 
nut Hill.  His  warm  interest  for  the  patriots  is  shown 
by  the  fact  that  two  of  his  sons  were  in  the  American 
army.  The  plundering  of  his  house  left  him  compara- 
tively poor,  but  he  purchased  another  small  home  on 
the  road  from  Chestnut  Hill  to  Barren  Hill.  Here  he 
quietly  spent  the  eventide  of  life  after  the  revolution. 
He  was  on  intimate  terms  with  many  of  the  leading 
men  of  Pennsylvania,  as  Governor  Mifflin  and  General 
(afterwards  Governor)  Hiester.  Rev.  Mr.  Muhlen- 
berg,  the  founder  of  the  Lutheran  Church,  remained  to 
his  death  a  warm  friend. 

Mr.  Schlatter  died  October  31, 1790,  and  was  buried 
(November  4)  in  the  Reformed  burying  ground  at  Phila- 
delphia, which  was  located  where  Franklin  Square  now 
is.  Dr.  Harbaugh  says  :  "  Directly  east  of  the  spark- 
ling jets,  a  few  feet  in  from  the  edge  of  the  circular 
gravel  walk,  under  the  green  sod  lie  Rev.  Messrs.  Stei- 
ner  and  Winkhaus,  and  Drs.  Weyberg  and  Hendel  the 
aged.  Directly  north  of  this  spot,  about  midway 
between  it  and  Vine  street,  lies  Rev.  Michael  Schlat- 
ter. As  in  the  case  of  the  rest,  his  tombstone  was  laid 
upon  the  grave  and  covered  with  a  grading." 


REV.    MICHAEL   SCHLATTER.  55 

So  passed  away  the  organizer  of  the  first  Coetus. 
He  was  a  man  of  medium  size,  with  clearly  defined 
Swiss  features.  He  was  always  careful  about  his  per- 
sonal appearance.  He  was  endowed  with  great  energy 
and  devotion,  was  of  an  impulsive  nature,  had  fine 
executive  ability,  showed  excellent  scholarship,  and 
exerted  a  wide  influence.  The  Church  in  which  he  was 
prominent  has  learned  to  recognize  the  greatness  and 
value  of  his  labors.  His  ten  years  of  activity  in  our 
Church  have  resulted  in  150  years  of  history.  What 
an  inspiration  to  us  !  How  immortal  and  eternal  is 
the  work  we  do  for  Christ !  We  may  die,  it  never  dies, 
but  lives  on  for  God  long  after  we  are  gone.  "  We  are 
building  for  eternity." 


VI. 
REV.  JOHN  PHILIP  LEYDICH. 

We  have  in  this  father  an  illustration  of  a  life  of 
quiet  activity  in  the  Master's  work — so  quiet  that  he  is 
apt  to  be  overlooked.  And  yet  it  is  the  quiet,  average 
pastor  that  does  the  most  of  God's  work  in  his  church. 
Mr.  Leydich's  life  is  also  specially  interesting  to  us, 
because  it  covers  a  large  part  of  the  history  of  the 
Coetus.  He  came  about  the  beginning  of  the  Coetus 
(in  1748)  and  lived  until  a  few  years  before  its  close, 
dying  in  1784.  He  is  an  illustration  of  the  first  long 
pastorate  in  the  Church,  lasting  nearly  forty  years 
(Boehm  being  the  only  one  before  him,  and  his  pastorate 
lasted  only  twenty-three  years).  But  his  life  is  also 
interesting,  because  in  its  events  and  vicissitudes  it 
reflects  the  changing  scenes  of  the  ordinary  Reformed 
minister  of  more  than  a  century  ago. 

Mr.  Leydich's  birthplace  is  unknown,  but  the  date 
of  his  birth  is  given  as  April  28,  1715.  His  literary 
and  theological  studies  were  pursued  in  Europe,  and 
he  was  ordained  there.  But  we  know  almost  nothing 
of  him  until  he  appears  at  Mr.  Schlatter's  house  in 


REV.    JOHN   PHILIP    LEYDICH.  57 

Philadelphia,  September  15,  1748,  accompanied  by  his 
wife  and  two  children.  He  had  been  sent  over  by  the 
Reformed  Synod  of  South  Holland  at  its  meeting  in 
Briel,  Holland.  He  had  letters  of  appointment  from 
that  Synod,  and  also  letters  from  the  deputies  of  Hol- 
land to  Rev.  Mr.  Schlatter,  which  the  latter  received, 
as  he  says,  with  heartfelt  thanksgiving. 

So  great  was  the  desire  among  the  Reformed  people 
for  ministers  in  those  days  (because  they  were  so  scarce) 
that  sometimes  the  congregations  would  lay  hold  of 
them  as  soon  as  they  arrived,  and,  without  waiting  for 
Coetus  or  any  church  authority,  send  calls  to  them,  as 
was  the  case  later  with  Rev.  Mr.  Gros  and  Mr.  Boos. 
So  Mr.  Leydich  had  hardly  arrived,  and  only  sufficient 
time  had  elapsed  for  the  news  to  get  to  Mr.  Boehm's 
home  near  Philadelphia,  when  that  old  patriarch  hur- 
ried to  Philadelphia.  "  On  the  19th,"  says  Mr.  Schlat- 
ter, "  Rev.  Mr.  Boahm,  with  an  elder  from  his  congre- 
gation at  Falkner  Swamp,  came  to  visit  me  and  begged 
that  Rev.  Mr.  Leydich  might  be  appointed  as  regular 
minister  in  the  above  named  place  and  in  Providence." 
Mr.  Bcehm,  at  his  advanced  age,  felt  that  he  could  no 
longer  care  for  these,  the  two  most  distant  points  in  his 
charge.  However,  as  the  Coetus  was  to  meet  soon,  it 
was  determined  to  let  the  matter  rest  until  its  meeting, 
but  Mr.  Leydich  preached  at  both  Falkner  Swamp  and 


58    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

Providence  with  great  acceptance  to  the  people.  On 
September  29  the  second  Coetus  met  at  Philadelphia, 
and  Mr.  Leydich  preached  the  opening  sermon.  He 
took  an  active  part  in  the  Coetus,  signing  with  the  rest 
of  his  brethren  his  adherence  to  the  Heidelberg  Cate- 
chism and  the  Canons  of  Dort.  Coetus  approved  of 
his  call  to  Falkner  Swamp  and  Providence,  and  Mr. 
Boehm  installed  him  over  these  congregations,  Octo- 
ber 9,  1748.  Here  he  continued  during  the  rest  of  his 
life,  for  he  served  only  one  charge.  At  one  time  his 
name  was  proposed  to  the  Philadelphia  congregation, 
but  he  was  not  elected.  Providence  wanted  him  in  the 
country  rather  than  in  the  city.  He  had  for  his  neigh- 
bor and  colleague  for  many  years  Rev.  Dr.  Muhlenberg 
at  the  Trappe,  the  patriarch  of  the  Lutheran  Church. 
His  life  covered  so  large  a  part  of  the  history  of  the 
Coetus  that  we  find  the  scenes  of  his  day  reflected  in 
his  life.  The  Indian  troubles  of  1755  did  not  quite 
reach  his  territory,  but  the  charges  neighboring  to  him 
on  the  north  suffered.  But  when  the  revolutionary 
war  broke  out,  his  charge  felt  its  influence  very  much, 
as  his  was  one  of  the  border  congregations.  He  was 
the  Reformed  minister  in  whose  parish  Valley  Forge 
was  located.  We  have  somewhere  read,  but  we  cannot 
recall  where,  just  at  present,  that  there  was  a  tradition 
that  one  of  the  Reformed  ministers  in  the  neighborhood 


REV.    JOHN    PHILIP    LEYDICH.  59 

of  Valley  Forge  preached  to  the  soldiers  in  camp.  We 
do  not  recall  who  the  minister  was,  but  as  Leydich  was 
nearest,  he  may  have  been  the  man.  We  shall  be  very 
thankful  if  any  one  can  correct  us  and  give  us  the 
name,  if  it  is  not  Leydich.  Three  of  his  churches  we 
know  were  used  as  hospitals  during  that  period — the 
churches  at  Trappe,  East  Vincent  and  Skippack. 

Rev.  J.  L.  Fluck,  in  his  "  History  of  the  Reformed 
Church  of  Chester  County,"  says :  "  The  Vincent 
church  was  used  as  a  hospital  during  the  pestilence 
that  broke  out  in  Washington's  army  in  camp  at  Val- 
ley Forge.  It  is  stated  by  earlier  writers  that  at  that 
time  Valley  Forge  could  be  seen  from  the  church. 
General  Washington,  whose  heart  was  with  his  men, 
frequently  visited  the  hospitals ;  and  while  at  this  one, 
his  headquarters  were  at  an  old  log  house  on  the  farm 
within  sight  of  the  church.  Twenty-two  of  the  sol- 
diers were  buried  there,  and  a  monument  was  erected  to 
them  in  1831,  one  of  whose  inscriptions  runs  thus  : 

'  Their  names,  though  lost  in  earth  below, 

And  hence  are  not  recorded  here, 
Are  known  where  lasting  pleasures  flow, 
Beyond  the  reach  of  death  and  fear.' ' 

We  have  no  doubt  that  Brother  Leydich,  as  a  faith- 
ful pastor  and  earnest  Christian,  often  visited  the  hos- 
pitals, cheering  the  men  with  the  consolations  of  our 
faith. 


60    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

Colonel  Frederick  Antes,  of  Pottstown,  one  of  his 
members  at  Falkner  Swamp,  was  a  prominent  patriot. 
He  was  on  one  occasion  almost  captured  at  his  home 
by  a  British  foraging  expedition,  which  seems  to  have 
penetrated  as  far  as  near  Pottstown. 

But  more  important  than  these  secular  experiences 
was  Rev.  Mr.  Leydich's  religious  activity.  He  was 
from  the  beginning  very  active  in  the  Coetus  and  very 
devoted  to  it.  In  the  early  controversy  he  sided 
with  Weiss  against  Schlatter.  When  that  difficulty 
was  healed  up,  no  one  was  more  loyal  than  he.  He 
was  the  treasurer  of  the  Coetus  for  a  number  of  years, 
its  president  in  1751  and  1760,  and  its  secretary  in 
1756  and  1768.  Year  after  year,  unless  prevented  by 
sickness,  he  was  present  at  its  meetings.  Statistics 
often  make  up  a  large  part  of  a  quiet  minister's  history 
and  reflect  his  work,  but  they  are  only  a  small  indica- 
tion of  the  amount  of  work  performed.  In  1760  he 
reports  102  families,  32  infant  baptisms,  13  adult  bap- 
tisms and  28  confirmations. 

The  Holland  fathers  requested  the  Coetus  to  have 
each  year  a  Visitor  appointed,  whose  duty  would  be  to 
visit  the  congregations,  and  Coetus  would  appoint  one 
of  its  prominent  members  to  attend  to  this  duty. 
Brother  Leydich  was  the  Visitor  in  1760,  and  faithfully 
attended  to  his  duty.  But  the  office  was  found  ini- 


REV.    JOHN    PHILIP    LEYDICH.  61 

practicable  and  soon  given  up  by  the  Coetus.  In  1763, 
when  the  Holland  fathers  wanted  to  know  how  much 
salary  each  minister  received,  he  declared  that  his  salary 
was  fifty-two  pounds  (about  $200).  He  said  that  if  he 
had  to  live  on  that,  he  would  accommodate  himself  to 
it  and  try  to  live  on  it.  He  did  not  confine  his  labors 
to  his  two  congregations,  but,  with  true  missionary 
spirit,  started  missionary  points.  He  revived  the  con- 
gregation at  Skippack  (which  had  gone  down  because 
of  the  rupture  between  Boshm  and  K-eiff),  and  he  had 
them  erect  their  church  in  1762.  He  also  began  ser- 
vices at  Salzburg  and  Upper  Mil  ford.  He  went  across 
the  Schuylkill  among  the  German  settlers,  and  held 
services  at  Vincent  and  Coventry.  In  1 765  he  reported 
to  Coetus  that  at  Providence  and  Vincent  he  had  54 
families,  of  which  24  were  at  Providence  and  30  at 
Vincent ;  that  he  had  had  32  baptisms  and  21  con- 
firmations, and  had  50  children  in  the  parish  schools. 
In  that  year  he  relinquished  the  congregations  at  Falk- 
ner  Swamp  and  Vincent,  because  of  increasing  infirmi- 
ties, to  Rev.  Mr.  Pomp,  and  kept  only  Providence  and 
Upper  Mil  ford,  and  soon  after  added  Coventry.  In 
1771  he  asked  that  Upper  Milford  be  taken  from  his 
charge  and  given  to  young  Mr.  Steiner,  but  it  did  not 
take  place.  Increasing  infirmities  kept  him  away  from 
the  Coetus,  and  we  do  not  find  him  present  in  1772. 


62    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

In  1773  he  was  present  and  reported  that  at  Pottstown, 
Providence  and  Coventry  he  had  136  families,  56  bap- 
tisms and  22  confirmations.  He  was  not  present  at 
Coetus  until  1782  (partly  on  account  of  war  troubles). 
He  was  present  in  1783,  when  he  reported  for  his  four 
congregations — Falkner  Swamp,  Pottstown,  Coventry 
and  Trappe — 152  families,  29  baptisms  and  32  con- 
firmations. When  the  next  Coetus  was  held,  May  12, 
1784,  at  Lancaster,  his  absence  was  noted,  together 
with  the  note  that  he  had  died  the  previous  winter. 
He  thus  preached  to  the  last  in  spite  of  weakness  and 
age.  And  although  he  tried  to  get  rid  of  some  of  his 
congregations  during  life,  they  came  back  to  him  before 
death,  for  he  had  the  same  congregations  then  that  he 
had  when  he  took  them  thirty-six  years  before.  His 
people  never  oeemed  to  tire  of  him,  and  were  always 
glad  to  have  him  back  or  to  come  back  to  him.  He 
died  January  4,  1784,  and  is  buried  in  a  private  bury- 
ing ground,  surrounded  by  a  stone  wall,  in  Frederick 
township,  Montgomery  county,  Pa.  His  gravestone 
bears  on  it,  in  addition  to  his  name  and  age,  "  2  Tim- 
othy 2  :  3.  Leidy  was  a  good  soldier  of  Jesus  Christ." 
Dr.  Harbaugh  tells  a  beautiful  story  about  him,  as 
follows :  "  Mrs.  Margaret  Moser,  who  died  in  Mont- 
gomery county,  Pa.,  aged  104  years,  was  baptized  in 
her  infancy  and  confirmed,  when  fourteen  years  old,  by 


REV.    JOHN    PHILIP    LEYDICH.  63 

Mr.  Leydich.  Paying  a  visit  to  this  venerable  woman 
on  June  14,  a  short  time  before  her  death,  we  asked  her 
whether  she  remembered  any  of  the  oldest  ministers  in 
this  country.  She  remained  silent  while  we  repeated 
the  names  of  quite  a  number,  until  we  mentioned  Ley- 
dich. At  the  mention  of  his  name  she  threw  up  her 
head,  her  eyes  brightened,  and  smiles  covered  her  aged 
face  while  she  said  :  '  O  yes,  Leydich,  he  was  a  good 
man.' "  What  a  testimony  to  his  life  and  work  !  She 
had  been  a  confirmed  member  of  the  Church  for  ninety 
years,  and  she  never  forgot  the  minister  who  confirmed 
her.  And  the  thing  that  impressed  her  most  about 
him  was  his  goodness.  We  have  no  doubt  that  Brother 
Leydich  was  a  faithful,  spiritually-minded  minister,  a 
quiet  laborer,  but  one  whose  reward  is  great  in  heaven. 


VII. 
KEY.  WILLIAM  OTTERBEIN. 

Otterbein's  life,  more  than  any  other,  covers  the 
whole  period  of  the  Coetus,  1747 — 1792.  Next  to  him 
in  length  of  service  seems  to  have  been  Waldschmidt 
and  Leydich.  Otterbein  covered  all  the  time  of  the 
Coetus,  except  five  years  at  its  beginning.  He  was  one 
of  the  band  of  six  whom  Schlatter  brought  from  Hol- 
land in  1752  Long  after  they  and  their  successors 
had  passed  away,  he  lived  on  into  the  next  century, 
dying  in  1813.  If,  as  the  Jews  believed,  old  age  was 
a  sign  of  God's  blessing,  Otterbeiu  was  wonderfully 
favored  of  God.  He  is  the  most  remarkable  case  of 
longevity  in  the  early  Coetus.  We  can,  therefore,  take 
his  life  as  covering  the  whole  period  of  the  Coetus. 
Other  prominent  Reformed  ministers  might  be  men- 
tioned, whose  ministry  was  important,  as  Alsentz, 
Weyberg,  Helffeustein,  Hendel  and  Helffrich,  but  their 
ministry  covers  only  a  part  of  the  time. 

William  Otterbein  was  born  June  3,  1726,  at  Dil- 
lenburg,  the  capital  of  the  county  of  Nassau-Dillenburg. 
He  came  from  a  family  prominent  in  Reformed  Church 


EEV.    WILLIAM    OTTERBEIN.  65 

history,  his  father,  grandfather  and  five  brothers  being 
Reformed  ministers  of  greater  or  less  prominence.  One 
of  them,  his  older  brother,  George  Gottfried,  published 
an  excellent  series  of  sermons  on  the  Heidelberg  Cate- 
chism in  1803.  The  Otterbein  family  always  stood  for 
Reformed  orthodoxy.  In  1742  he  entered  the  Univer- 
sity of  the  Nassau  line  of  princes,  located  at  Herborn, 
which  Olevianus  had  founded.  In  1748  he  was  a 
teacher  at  Herborn,  was  ordained  in  1749,  and  became 
vicar  or  assistant  to  the  pastor  of  the  Reformed  con- 
gregation at  Ockersdorf.  But  his  soul  had  in  it  an 
undeveloped  love  for  missionary  work,  which  impelled 
him  to  seek  a  larger  and  more  difficult  field  than  his 
native  Nassau  land.  This  desire,  Dr.  Harbaugh  says, 
was  nurtured  in  his  mind  by  his  pious  mother,  who 
wished  him  to  become  a  missionary.  He  yielded  to 
this  inclination,  and  in  1752  joined  the  missionary 
baud  of  six  who  came  with  Mr.  Schlatter  to  evangelize 
this  western  land. 

Soon  after  his  arrival  in  America  he  was  called  to 
Lancaster,  and  was  engaged  by  that  congregation  for 
five  years.  He  entered  on  his  ministry  there  in  Au- 
gust, 1752.  This  congregation  had  had  an  unprofit- 
able experience  with  its  previous  ministers,  Vock,  Rie- 
ger  and  Schnorr,  the  latter  having  been  a  drunkard. 
Otterbein,  therefore,  found  it  a  very  difficult  field. 


66     EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

Still,  his  coming  so  encouraged  the  congregation  that 
soon  after  his  arrival  they  replaced,  in  1753,  the  little 
old  wooden  church  with  a  massive  structure,  which 
stood  for  a  century.  Mr.  Otterbein's  labors  imparted 
to  the  congregation  consolidation  and  character.  But 
he  seems  to  have  tired  of  his  engagement  there  for  five 
years,  and  declared  at  Coetus  that  he  would  never 
again  accept  an  engagement  for  a  stipulated  length  of 
time.  He  was  disheartened  by  the  lack  of  spirituality 
among  the  people  and  by  their  carelessness  about 
church  discipline.  So  at  the  end  of  his  engagement 
to  them  he  wanted  to  resign,  but  the  people  would  not 
listen  to  it.  They  were  willing  to  do  anything  to  retain 
him,  and  promised  to  have  strict  discipline  enforced  in 
the  congregation.  This  was  agreed  to  in  a  paper  signed 
by  eighty  of  the  male  members  of  the  church,  which  is 
still  extant.  Coetus  (1757)  therefore  urged  him  to 
remain  and  called  him  "  a  most  excellent  pastor/'  He 
therefore  remained  at  Lancaster  and  established  a  cus- 
tom that  the  pastor  should  have  a  personal  interview 
with  each  communicant  before  he  came  to  the  Lord's 
supper,  a  custom  which  was  continued  there  for  seventy- 
five  years.  The  truth  is,  that  Mr.  Otterbein  had  had 
a  deep  religious  experience  while  at  Lancaster,  which 
he  calls  his  conversion.  This  led  him  to  set  a  higher 
standard  of  life  and  experience  among  his  people.  In 


REV.    WILLIAM    OTTERBEIN.  67 

his  home  land  in  Germany  the  custom  of  speaking 
with  the  communicants  before  communion  was  a  com- 
mon one  in  some  Reformed  congregations,  as  is  shown 
by  the  diary  of  Prof.  Frederick  Lampe,  pastor  at  Duis- 
burg,  the  most  prominent  theologian  among  the  Re- 
formed. The  custom  was  not  original  with  Otterbein  ; 
he  simply  revived  it. 

Otterbein,  therefore,  remained  a  year  longer  at  Lan- 
caster, but  he  then  resigned  with  the  intention  of 
returning  to  Europe  and  visiting  his  relatives.  But  the 
severe  winter  and  the  war  with  France  made  ocean-trav- 
elling dangerous,  so  that  he  changed  his  mind  and  post- 
poned his  trip.  He  became  then  temporarily  pastor  of 
the  Tulpehocken  charge,  however  remaining  there  a 
number  of  years.  While  there  he  declined  a  call  to 
Frederick,  Maryland,  in  1759.  And  in  1760  his  Tul- 
pehocken congregation  announced  to  Coetus  with  joy 
that  he  had  determined  to  remain  with  them  longer  ; 
but  in  1760  the  Frederick  congregation  renewed  its 
call,  and  he  accepted  it,  because  he  felt  the  isolation  of 
that  church,  and  saw  in  it  a  wide  field  for  missionary 
work,  for  the  congregations  in  Maryland  were  in  a 
measure  separated  from  those  in  Pennsylvania.  At 
Frederick  he  built  a  new  church,  and  Coetus  says  he 
almost  worked  himself  to  death.  He  remained  there 
for  five  years.  He  must  have  been  a  very  popular 


68    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

man  among  the  churches,  for  no  man  received  so  many 
calls  from  congregations  or  refused  so  many.  While 
at  Frederick  he  was  called  (1761 )  to  Reading.  Goshen- 
hoppen,  at  the  Coetns  of  1762,  declared  that  if  they 
could  get  him,  they  would  like  to  have  him.  He  was 
called  (1763)  to  Philadelphia,  which  was  then  the  lead- 
ing congregation  in  the  Coetus,  but  he  declined  them 
all.  In  1765  he  accepted  a  call  to  York,  although  the 
elder  from  Frederick  declared  at  the  Coetus  that  there 
was  very  great  need  for  a  minister  at  Frederick,  because 
of  the  great  number  of  convicted  and  awakened  sinners 
there — the  effect  of  Mr.  Otterbein's  earnest  preaching. 
After  he  left  Frederick,  the  congregation  there  kept  up 
their  own  services,  even  when  they  had  no  preacher, 
for  he  had  trained  the  spiritually  minded  ones  to  hold 
prayer  meetings.  His  successor  there,  Lang,  was  a 
man  of  opposite  mould.  He  derided  these  Pietists,  as 
he  called  them.  And  when  Otterbein  came  back  to 
visit  Frederick,  and  was  asked  by  the  Pietists  to  preach, 
Lang  refused  to  permit  him  to  enter  his  pulpit  and 
made  complaint  against  him  to  Coetus.  The  action 
which  the  Coetus  of  1767  took  was  a  very  summary 
one.  It  evidently  was  not  going  to  discipline  a  man 
who  was  perhaps  the  most  popular  of  them  among  the 
churches,  and  without  doubt  the  most  spiritually- 
minded  among  them,  except  perhaps  Hendel.  They 


REV.    WILLIAM    OTTERBEIN.  69 

did  not  discipline  him  for  being  a  Pietist,  for  many  of 
them,  perhaps  most  of  them,  as  Prof.  Dubbs  says,  had 
in  Germany  been  educated  in,  and  sympathized  with, 
that  type  of  Reformed  activity  so  common  among  the 
Reformed  of  the  northern  Rhine.  Coetus  very  abruptly 
ordered  Lang  to  seek  some  other  charge  as  soon  as  he 
could,  which  he  did  very  soon.  So  Otterbein  was  vin- 
dicated by  the  Coetus. 

During  his  pastorate  at  York,  Otterbein  took  a  trip 
to  Europe,  being  absent  for  a  year  and  a  half.  But  so 
popular  was  he  among  his  people  that  they  refused  to 
give  him  up,  and  their  church  was  supplied  by  mem- 
bers of  Coetus  during  his  absence.  When  he  landed 
in  Europe,  he  met  his  brother,  George  Godfried,  pas- 
tor at  Duisburg.  After  the  first  welcome  salutation 
and  the  evening  meal,  the  brothers  retired  to  the  study 
to  unfold  their  inmost  thoughts  and  their  experiences 
during  the  past  eighteen  years  since  last  they  were 
together.  William  related  his  spiritual  experiences. 
His  brother  listened  with  deepest  attention,  and,  rising 
from  his  chair,  and  tears  running  down  his  cheeks,  he 
embraced  his  American  brother,  saying :  "  My  dear 
William,  we  are  one.  Blessed  be  the  name  of  the 
Lord — not  only  brothers  after  the  flesh,  but  after  the 
spirit.  I  have  also  experienced  the  same  blessing.  I 
can  testify  that  God  has  power  on  earth  to  forgive  sins 
6 


70    EAELY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

and  to  cleanse  from  all  unrighteousness."  At  another 
time  this  older  brother,  while  walking  with  William, 
said  to  him  :  "  My  dear  brother,  I  have  a  very  strong 
impression  that  God  has  a  great  work  for  you  to  do  in 
America." 

To  do  this  work,  Otterbein  returned  to  America 
and  ministered  to  the  York  congregation  for  three 
years  more.  In  1774  he  accepted  a  call  to  the  Second 
Reformed  church  of  Baltimore.  The  church  at  Balti- 
more had  split.  Quite  a  number  of  its  members,  dis- 
satisfied with  their  minister,  Rev.  J.  C.  Faber,  who 
was  not  a  member  of  the  Coetus,  and  desiring  a  more 
earnest  preacher,  seceded  in  1770,  and  called  Mr. 
Swope,  who  had  been  licensed  by  the  Coetus.  The 
Coetus  tried  again  and  again  to  bring  the  two  congre- 
gations together,  but  in  vain,  and  finally  the  Second 
congregation  called  Mr.  Otterbein. 

Mr.  Otterbein,  by  his  removal  to  Baltimore,  found 
an  immense  mission  field  among  the  Germans.  The 
lack  of  Reformed  ministers  was  all  the  greater,  because 
the  Holland  fathers  declared,  in  1773,  that  Maryland 
did  not  fall  under  their  jurisdiction.  Besides,  all  the 
ministers  sent  from  Holland  were  captured  by  the 
Pennsylvania  congregations  before  they  got  as  far  as 
Maryland.  For  twenty  years  the  Reformed  of  Vir- 
ginia had  sent  petitions  to  Coetus  for  pastors,  but  had 


KEV.    WILLIAM    OTTERBEIN.  71 

not  received  any  during  that  time.  The  congregation 
at  Frederick  had  been  for  a  long  time  an  outlying  con- 
gregation, and  had  a  vast  mission  field  connected  with 
it.  Mr.  Steiner,  Mr.  Otterbein's  predecessor,  declared 
that  to  go  round  his  charge  required  a  journey  of  300 
miles,  and  he  said  that  in  one  year  he  travelled  nearly 
3,000  miles. 

Thus  Mr.  Otterbein  found  not  only  a  wide  field 
north  of  him  in  Maryland,  but  a  vast  field  south  of 
him  in  Virginia.  Many  of  the  preaching  points  had 
no  churches,  so  that  meetings  were  held  at  first  in  barns 
or  in  the  open  air.  Out  of  this  grew  a  great  religious 
awakening,  which  began  about  1770,  or  later.  This 
movement  seems  to  have  been  under  the  control  and 
guidance  of  the  Reformed  ministers,  all  of  them  in  that 
neighborhood,  except  the  pastor  of  the  First  Reformed 
congregation  of  Baltimore,  and  Rev.  Mr.  Faber  at 
Taneytown,  entering  into  it.  This  movement  was 
finally  organized  at  Antietam,  May  29,  1774,  when 
Otterbein  and  Swope  organized  classes  or  praying  cir- 
cles. The  next  meeting  was  held  at  Pipe  Creek, 
June  12,  1775,  when  other  Reformed  ministers  were 
present,  as  Heuop  of  Frederick  and  Weimer  of  Ha- 
gerstown.  From  York  came  Rev.  Mr.  Wagner,  one 
of  the  most  faithful  Reformed  ministers,  and  even  from 
Tulpehocken,  Pa.,  came  Rev.  Mr.  Hendel,  the  most 


72    EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

spiritually-minded  of  them  all.  They  met  again  in 
Maryland,  October  15,  1775.  On  June  2  and  Octo- 
ber 2,  1776,  they  held  meetings.  At  these  meetings 
they  heard  reports  from  the  praying  circle  in  the 
churches  and  organized  new  circles.  Whether  other 
meetings  were  held  later,  we  do  now  know.*  They 
did  not  dream  of  such  a  movement  being  un-Reformed, 
for  in  the  northern  Rhine  region  such  prayer  circles 
are  quite  common  in  the  Reformed  congregations.  The 
Reformed  district  of  Siegen  to-day  is  quite  full  of  such 
meetings.  And  we  once  came  nearly  attending  a  cate- 
chism prayer  meeting  at  Barmen,  which  we  accidentally 
missed,  much  to  our  disappointment.  Such  move- 
ments were  Reformed  from  the  beginning. 

During  all  this  time  Mr.  Otterbein  continued  active 
in  the  Coetus,  as  well  as  in  the  missionary  field.  His 
ministry  at  Baltimore  continued  for  thirty-six  years. 
There  he  was  greatly  honored,  and  exerted  quite  a 
wide  influence,  not  only  over  the  German  Reformed, 
but  on  other  denominations.  He  was  called  upon  to 
aid  in  the  ordination  of  Bishop  Asbury  of  the  Metho- 
dist Church. 

After  a  blessed  ministry,  from  whose  active  labors 
he  seems  to  have  retired  somewhat  during  the  last  few 

*  For  a  full  report  of  these  meetings  see  Prof.  Dubbs'  in   Reforme4 
Quarterly  Review,  January,  1884. 


REV.    WILLIAM    OTTERBELN.  73 

years,  Rev.  Mr.  Otterbein  was  called  to  his  reward, 
October  17,  1813.  The  venerable  Rev.  Dr.  Kurtz,  of 
the  Lutheran  Church,  attended  him  on  his  deathbed. 
After  Dr.  Kurtz  had  prayed,  the  dying  saint  said,  like 
Simeon  :  "  Lord,  now  lettest  Thou  Thy  servant  depart 
in  peace."  Later  he  uttered  his  last  words  :  "  Jesus, 
Jesus,  I  die,  but  Thou  livest ;  and  soon  I  shall  live 
with  Thee.  The  conflict  is  over.  I  begin  to  feel  an 
unspeakable  fulness  of  divine  love  and  peace.  Lay 
my  head  on  my  pillow  and  be  still." 

It  hardly  comes  within  the  scope  of  this  article  to 
enter  into  the  relation  of  Mr.  Otterbein  to  the  United 
Brethren  Church,  which  claims  him  as  its  founder  and 
first  minister,  as  that  occurred  after  the  time  of  the 
Coetus,  whose  sesqui-centennial  we  are  celebrating. 
One  thing,  however,  is  very  certain,  that  during  the 
days  of  the  Coetus,  up  to  1791,  there  is  not  a  whisper 
that  Mr.  Otterbein  did  not  belong  to  the  Reformed 
Church.  We  believe  Dr.  Harbaugh,  in  the  "  Fathers 
of  the  Reformed  Church,"  and  Prof.  Dubbs,  in  the 
"  Reformed  Quarterly  Review,"  January,  1884,  have 
proved  that  he  never  left  the  Reformed  Church.  Dur- 
ing the  days  of  the  Coetus  there  was  no  one  who  stood 
higher  among  the  Reformed  or  was  more  devoted  to 
the  Coetus  than  he.  He  was  its  president  in  1757  and 
1766.  He  rarely  missed  a  meeting,  and  was  absent 


74     EARLY  FATHERS  OF  THE  REF.  CHURCH. 

only  a  few  times  without  sending  an  excuse.  His 
absence  was  often  caused  by  his  distance  from  the  place 
of  meeting.  He  was  present  at  the  last  meeting  of  the 
Coetus  in  1791.  Dr.  Harbaugh  is  right  when  he  says, 
over  against  the  United  Brethren,  that  no  minister 
stood  better  and  labored  more  regularly  in  the  Re- 
formed Church  than  Otterbein.  We  would,  however, 
call  attention  to  three  things  which  may  bear  on  this 
subject,  and  which  are  revealed  during  his  connection 
with  the  Coetus,  all  of  which  would  unfit  him  to 
become  a  United  Brethren  : 

1.  He  was  Calvinistic.     He  signed  not  merely  the 
Heidelberg  Catechism,  but  also  the  Canons  of  Dort  in 
1752.     He  was  educated  at  Herborn,  where  Lampe's 
Federal  Theology    was   taught.      He  was,   therefore, 
theologically  unfit  for  the  United  Brethren,  who  were 
Arminians,  and  not  Calvinists.     It  is  to  be  remem- 
bered that  in  those  days  the  distinctions  between  Cal- 
vinists and  Arminians  was  much  more  closely  drawn 
than  now. 

2.  He  was  strict  in   his   catechization,   while   the 
United  Brethren  have  ridiculed  that  method. 

3.  He  was  not  possessed  of  a  loud  voice  suited  for 
noisy   meetings.      The   congregation    at    Philadelphia, 
when  it  called  him,  found  some  of  its  members  opposed 
to  him  because  of  his  weak  voice.     He  seems  to  have 


REV.    WILLIAM    OTTERBEIN.  75 

been  quiet  in  his  manner,  very  different  from  those  who 
organized  finally  the  United  Brethren  Church. 

Such  was  the  long  and  honored  life  of  one  who 
claimed  to  be  Reformed  up  to  the  time  of  his  death. 
Stahlschmidt,  in  his  book,  "A  Pilgrimage  by  Land 
and  Sea,"  pays  a  fine  compliment  to  Otterbein,  whom 
he  met  in  1773.  He  says  :  "  He  is  a  very  gentle  and 
friendly  man,  and  on  account  of  his  devout  and  pious 
course  of  life  is  known  and  highly  respected  through- 
out the  whole  land." 

Otterbein  was  a  tower  of  strength  for  the  Reformed, 
especially  for  spirituality  and  missionary  zeal  in  those 
days  of  coldness  and  missionary  destitution.  He 
exerted  a  blessed  influence  on  the  Coetus,  and  has  left 
a  blessed  memory  behind  him  in  the  Church  which  he 
loved. 


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